Many people across the country hold the belief that ski resorts in the Pacific Northwest aren’t very good. The resort everyone seems to point to is the Summit at Snoqualmie. There are usually 3 main complaints that people use are that the snow is too wet, the terrain is bad, and that it overall isn’t very fun compared to other resorts.
Throughout the years, Snoqualmie has had extremely wet, heavy snow. So heavy, in fact, that if your DINs are set up for other mountains like Grand Targhee, the sheer weight of the snow will force your skis off without even crashing. The kind of snow that Snoqualmie gets is perfect for snowball fights, snowmen, snow forts, etc. but is horrible for skiing.
The terrain at Snoqualmie is fairly bad. One might think that the tree runs would be amazing due to the fact that there’s just so many, but having as many trees as Snoqualmie does actually makes it so there is very little coverage inside the trees. Having low coverage in the trees is not only not fun, but very dangerous, as it makes getting caught on roots and rocks a lot more likely.
It’s true that Snoqualmie doesn’t have very difficult runs. There are very few blacks and literally no double blacks on the whole mountain. However, difficulty doesn’t necessarily mean fun. But it does in this case. Almost every run is exactly the same pathing: go either left or right off the lift, then a straight shot down the mountain. The variability lies in the width and steepness, and whether or not moguls are present.
I may have spent the entire time listing all the downsides of Snoqualmie, but I actually think it’s a decent resort. It may be bad on paper, but it seems to just have this unseen characteristic that makes it so much fun whenever I go there with my friends. The fact that it’s hard to ski well there means that when the opportunity finally comes to ski somewhere known for being good, suddenly you’ll find you have this ability to ski as well as that 3-year-old that can do a double backflip. Overall, if you know how to ski there and who to ski with, it’s definitely not as bad as the Colorado kids say it is.
