49* North, Whitewater, Red Mountain

I just did a five day trip starting at 49° North.
49 is a fun mountain. It doesn't have very much legitimate black diamond steep skiing, but it has a boatload of great trees. The snow was good and you could ski anywhere which meant I spent a whole lot of time in the trees. I was lucky enough to have a local show me the good spots of which they were a lot. There are two main basins served by four lifts. The snow quality needs to be good enough so that you can ski off piste. As good as the skiing was a 49 it just got better and better.
Whitewater it Is set in a basin underneath Ymir Mountain which acts l as a snow trap. It is basically a three lift mountain, Two the lifts are on either side of the basin and then there's a third lift on the backside. One of the basin lifts serves mostly intermediate terrain and it is very reminiscent of 49° North with some really fun tree skiing. The opposite Side lift goes much higher and leads to everything from groomers to really steep three runs. The backside lift has more varied terrain, with steep tree runs, some flat benches, open steep moguled runs, and lots of glades. Whitewater has a policy about ropes. Unless the rope line says Closed Area Boundary, you can duck the tope and ski. I ducked.a lot of ropes. There are also some nice traverses out to interesting places. All of the off piste skid well, although the steep trees were awfully bumped out. A real bonus was the mountain host program. I got with a group of really good skiers and the host took us all over the place, A black diamond, rope ducking, tour for sure. Whitewater is easily worth a couple of days.
Red Mountain is big. It stretches across three peaks, all of which have plenty of black diamond skiing. The snow was good here too. All of the lifts are slow and long, which makes for better snow preservation and a longer recoup time for aging legs. Granite Peak, which is the main peak, can be skied 360° it is basically a Long ridge with a steep front, a mellow side and a steeper side. The mellow side has a chair that serves groomers, mellow trees, and steeper trees. Skiers right of the main chair get you to some of the best ,continuous fall line, open, to glades, to tighter finish, runs I have skied. Gray Mountain has its own chair that serves more outstanding, open to glades to trees. Skiers left of the chair, the farther out you go, the better it got. This area is a bit more mellow then the steep stuff on Granite Mountain. I only had two days at Red but I could have easily have spent double that and still not skied the whole mountain.
I had a good snow this whole trip with some small refreshes and a legitimate powder day my last day at Red. Lift lines were never a problem especially at 49 which was empty on a Sunday.
This made a really fun loop trip to three lesser known mountains although I would do it soon as this area it is rapidly becoming discovered.
I channeled Zap for this trip

Great TR.

It has been years since I visited 49 but I remember the tree skiing. They used to offer a discount from ACE Hardware. I would park the campervan at the Casino in town.

Last year, I think Red was bought by "the locals". Granite brings back "powder days". My legs were younger.

It is so close to enjoy the smaller ski areas. 

Nice road trip. I have visited all 3 but on separate trips in April, when WW and Red were closed on weekdays. Locals were skinning all over Granite on the weekend.
Does 49 still offer free lifts tickets in April if they have turned a profit? That's how we skied there.

The last week at 49 degrees north is free.  Thank Toyota for that.

April 2 -8