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Outside magazine lists North America’s 16 best ski resorts

Get out your calendar — it’s time to start carving out vacation time for a ski trip. El Niño is bringing an early 2009-10 snow season to California, and since airlines keep offering cheap fares, there’s no reason why an avid skier or boarder can’t think about sampling ski resorts across the country. Outside magazine’s November issue highlights its “Winter Hot List” including North America’s 16 Best Ski Resorts.

What I love about this list is that it adds a hot travel tip at the bottom of the review like this great weather advice for Alta: “If there’s a big storm coming, spend the night in Little Cottonwood Canyon, not Salt Lake. They’ll close Highway 210 to do avalanche work, and by the time they open it you’ll have had both resorts to yourself for three hours.”

Here are the resorts that made the cut:

- Alta/Snowbird, Utah
- Jackson Hole, Wyo.
- Alyeska Resort, Ala.
- Silverton Mountain, Col.
- Breckenridge, Col.
- Whistler-Blackcomb, British Columbia
- Park City, Utah

- Aspen/Snowmass, Col.
- Powder Mountain, Utah
- Jay Peak, Vt.
- Bridger Bowl, Mont.
- Crested Butte, Col.
- Revelstoke Mountain Resort, British Columbia
- Steamboat, Col.
- Taos, N.M.
- Mammoth Mountain, Calif.

Was your favorite ski resort left out? In all fairness, Outside opened up a smack-down comments board where one reader was surprised Vail wasn’t on the list. The list skews toward Colorado and Lake Tahoe ski resorts are not mentioned at all. Which resorts do you think they neglected to mention?

– Jen Leo, Los Angeles Times Travel & Deal blogger

[Image: Outside, November issue; courtesy of Outside]

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 7, 2009 at 12:02 pm by Jen Leo and is filed under News, Tips & Advice, Outdoors & Adventure, Ski & Winter, Winter. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.

3 Comments on “Outside magazine lists North America’s 16 best ski resorts”

alwaysatrojan84 Says:
November 7th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
Mammoth is a great mountain but the town can get old fast and for groups of differing abilities Mammoth is just that, Mammoth is just that. My choice is a tie between Kirkwood and Alpine Meadows, neither have much going after the lifts close but both are close to towns, South Lake, Truckee and Lake Tahoe’s North Shore to make them a great choice. That and usually long seasons make Kirkwood and Alpine a great choice and get my vote.
Boraxo Says:
November 8th, 2009 at 4:24 pm
Leaving out Squaw Valley leaves the survey with little credibility. It is certainly in the top ten for both terrain and nightlife.
julien Says:
November 9th, 2009 at 11:31 pm
I’m glad to see Jay Peak on the list. Best place in the Northeast. Le Massif in Charlevoix Quebec is also great.