WORDS • Phil Krening | PHOTOS • Michael Remke (@mycoremke)
There’s a certain corner of southern Colorado’s San Juan Mountains that is fabled among powder hounds—legendary to the brink of being almost mythical. It’s not Narnia, but it’s damn close. It’s a place I learned about as a young man from skiers that I looked up to, whom I considered authorities, connoisseurs. It’s a place that holds the mystique of being simultaneously remote and difficult to access in addition to consistently producing some of the deepest storm totals in the southern Rocky Mountains. This place is Wolf Creek, and more specifically, it’s the complex of glades, chutes and ridges accessible from the Alberta chair that compose the sprawling backcountry-esque southeastern flank of the ski area.
You won’t find big alpine terrain at Wolf Creek, or a fancy lodge. From the parking lot the place looks a little benign, not exactly noteworthy. But for powder skiing—this is the spot and chances are you’ll never witness a lift-line or find someone scoping the same descent as you. There is a particularly apparent storm track that blesses the area with the copious quantities of snow it’s known for. A friend once told me that when it’s pissing rain in Los Angeles in January, you know Wolfie’s about to get dumped on. While this might be a little simplistic, a southern storm track typical of an El Niño year is known to produce storms that stick in Wolf Creek Pass’ craw and pound for hours and days, obscuring vision, thwarting automobile travel and delivering some of the best powder skiing conditions I’ve ever experienced.
This season has already produced a couple one-off storm systems that have provided the characteristically deep conditions Wolfie is fabled for.
Watch the storms, and get there, if you can.
