Skiing in Utah

Over the last couple of weeks I’ve been ice-climbing and skiing in Utah. The aim was to climb more, but with such good snow and easy backcountry access I’ve done more skiing than climbimg.

With a new lightweight ski touring set up I was super keen to do as much backcountry skiing as possible.

Ski Touring set up looking out over the Wasatch Mountains…

I had a few days in the resorts when the powder days were good, at Solitude and Snowbird. It wasn’t hard to find the powder as they had over 100inches of snow whilst I was there! I got lucky with conditions for skiing in Utah, as the European Alps had barely got any snow at all…

Each day driving up Little Cottonwood Canyon past the ice climbs, it was a bit gutting, but when the snow is so good you can’t say no. With ski tours in both Big and Little Cottonwood Canyon, I got to see lots of areas and experience the best of skiing in Utah.

Looking down to Salt Lake City, from the summit of Hidden Peak, Snowbird.

It wasn’t until the last weekend that I dusted off the ice axes. A few local climbers took me to a little known spot called Battlecreek Valley. In a beautiful setting in a steep valley, we had some lovely ice falls to ourselves. It was great to get the forearms working after all the skiing!

Pure Fun, a great ice route in Battlecreek Canyon

The view from Battle Creek Canyon. Not bad…

Over the 2 weeks I got to ski more powder than I’ve ever seen, ski some steep couloirs and visit some amazing places. I’d definitely recommend skiing in Utah to anyone, and there’s some pretty decent ice climbing too!

Here’s a great resource to the ski and avalanche sonditions in Utah of you’re heading out there…