For the Big Snows, Go West

Across the nation the first big crowds of skiers hit the slopes last week, and the new season was under way. Chances are good that wherever they went, skiers found new lifts, fresh trails, better lodges. But nowhere is the change more dramatic than in the West, where the mountains are higher, the snow deeper, and the enthusiasts are showing up each year in ever increasing numbers. Since last winter, new resorts have blossomed at Alpental, Wash., 55 miles east of Seattle in the Cascades, and at Bear Valley, Calif., a remote area in the northern Sierras that boasts the record U.S. annual snowfall--73 ft. in the winter of 1906-07. At Alta, Utah, a 5,100-ft.-long lift has been added to open up the powder-rich Albion Basin, until now accessible only by climbing on skis. Vail, Colo., has developed a whole new mountain called Golden Peak.

The activity is most frantic at Colorado's $13 million Snowmass-at-Aspen, far and away the biggest new winter resort to be developed since Alec Gushing (TIME cover, Feb. 9, 1959) built up Squaw Valley for the 1960 Olympics. At Snowmass, Bill Janss, 49, a millionaire Los Angeles land developer and onetime U.S. Olympic Team skier, has carved out 2,000 acres of slopes with 50 miles of trails and five double-chair lifts on Mount Baldy (13,-162 ft.), which have already matched the ski area of the three nearby mountains served by the town of Aspen proper, ten miles distant (see map).

Frosting the Cake. "You shouldn't open a good resort making excuses, saying 'Here's a little bit of it now, and we'll add the rest some other time,' " Janss explains. To deliver the whole package all at once, he began three years ago-to install the lift towers. Then last spring, as soon as the snows melted, he set to work, in partnership with the American Cement Co., to create a new town called West Village. By last week it had grown to five lodges, 118 condominium apartments, six restaurants, 20 shops, a convention center, swimming pool and a skating rink.

Not everything was ready for the opening; plastic still fills some paneless shop windows, and some cinder-block walls are as yet unpainted. But Snowmass was booked to its 1,000 capacity. And to frost the cake, a blanket of feathery snow drifted down over the slopes as the first guests arrived.

What is making Snowmass take off is the reputation of Bill Janss, who with his brother Edwin bought Sun Valley from the Union Pacific in 1964, turned it around from a has-been resort to a year-round success and favorite Christmas camping ground for the Kennedy clan. Even before Snowmass opened, house lots were bought by Fairchild Camera President Richard Hodgson, Borg-Warner Chairman Robert Ingersoll and Defense Secretary Mc-Namara (whose $75,000 private lodge has already been completed). The last 40 of the 104 lower-priced condominiums ($17,000 for a studio-efficiency) were sold out in 24 hours.

Real Belly-Grabber. The other big factor in Snowmass' success is Mount Baldy's fabulous reputation among top skiers. From the warming hut at 11,700 ., atop an alpine meadow known as Big Burn (so named for a forest fire of a century ago), stretches an expanse of powder a mile wide. Uninterrupted runs? Some of Baldy's trails are over three miles long. From Sam's Knob, the halfway point restaurant, there are 15 runs, ranging from easy intermediate to the expert's "Powderhorn," which ends up in a knee-pounding 35DEG, 400-yd. schuss that Mountain Manager Jim Snobble describes as "a real belly-grabber." Norwegian Olympic Champion Stein Eriksen, hired away from Vermont's Sugarbush to head the Snowmass Ski School, rates it "as tough as they come."

At Aspen, experts gravitate to Aspen Mountain (known by skiers as "Ajax") or Aspen Highlands; the beginners head for Buttermilk. Baldy will have something for everyone in the family, from the novice's Fanny Hill to the top. Interestingly, Aspen shows little resentment toward its competitive new neighbor. The reasons are simple: Snowmass has hired Aspen's Ski Corp. to manage its mountain, and Aspen is frank in admitting that it had about run out of nearby mountain slopes to develop. In fact, Aspen and Snowmass will mutually honor each other's lift tickets. And to make sure skiers can get around, the two resorts will be linked by a mountaintop helicopter service.

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