Our first hint that we weren’t going to be in for a disappointing experience occurred immediately upon arrival, when an employee stationed on the access road directed us past the normal skier parking area up toward the valet parking lot at the Moonlight Basin Lodge. We parked, and another staff member hustled right over. I half expected to be told I couldn’t park there, but no…. He effusively asked if this was our first visit. Later we felt we should have taken them up on the valet parking, just for a novel experience, but walking perhaps 75 yards to the lodge is not really an undue hardship. At the end of the day, there were still probably less than twenty vehicles in the lot, and I suspect the valet parking dudes had kind of a boring day.

Upon entering the lodge, we were again warmly greeted by everybody present, and were certainly favorably impressed so far. I swear, they must have hauled money up there in dump trucks, and I’d venture to say no expense was spared in the construction of the lodge. Very impressive…. We were greeted by a distinguished looking gentleman, who turned out to be the lodge manager. I put the pump handle on him about a few things, mainly regarding the effect of the new lift-serviced terrain on the existing backcountry snowcat skiing operation, as well as some interesting things I’d noticed further west in the undeveloped portion of the Moonlight Basin property. Turns out he doesn’t ski, and didn’t know! But then we met another guy who certainly looked like he knew how to turn both directions. I figured him for a ski patrolman, but he turned out to be the mountain manager, and yes, he knew the answers to my questions and then some. When we met, we were in the process of carrying our skis through the lodge. That was mildly disconcerting, as it’s obvious the place is mainly geared toward a very high-end crowd, who are staying slopeside and ski from their condos or cabins. Or, perhaps upon departing their penthouse suites (those start at $2,150,000.00), presumably have their skis brought to them by staff members. So anyway, I was about half nervous that I’d inadvertently stab a ski pole into a custom-built leather sofa, or break an etched-glass window with a ski tip, or some other faux pas, and commented to the mountain manager that it didn’t appear carrying skis through the lodge was exactly standard procedure. He laughed and agreed. They’re not really set up for handling Joe Local skier/boarder yet. By next season, a separate lodge for the Ridge Hippie/brownbag crowd will be open. For this season, though, you have a unique opportunity to experience some really quite extraordinary service on the cheap! Apparently, skiing was free last Friday, their first day of operation, and was discounted to $34 on Saturday. Normally it’ll be $39, but there’s a loyalty discount of $5 if you produce a lift ticket from a prior visit.

Just as a further example of the level of service we’re talking about here, there is a guide service available, at no charge for first-time visitors. An experienced staff member will show you around the mountain for an hour and a half or so, completely gratis! We probably should have taken them up on that, but while we were perusing the trail map, another staff member hustled right over and explained the layout, and so we ventured up the Iron Horse lift. Incidentally, the Iron Horse and Pony Express lifts are shared with Big Sky resort, and were built primarily to offer access to Big Sky from existing condos and castles on the lower reaches of Lone Mountain. With the development of the Moonlight Basin ski area, though, they now also offer some nice cruiser runs down to the showpiece Six-Shooter lift. That is a high-speed, six-place chairlift, undoubtedly capable of moving significant numbers of skiers up the mountain post haste. Saturday, the number of skiers and boarders using it could have just about been counted on the fingers of a careless butcher, and liftlines were absolutely not a problem! That lift really moves along, and in fact given the brisk temperatures we were thinking that some sort of windshield would just about be in order!

So, the skiing; the Six-Shooter ends in a bowl high on the northeast face of Lone Mountain. The runs descending from there are nice, rolling, cruiser runs cut through the trees. Almost like an eastern US ski area, except with better snow! They’re mostly rated intermediate and expert, but even the black diamond runs aren’t going to strike fear into anyone with even modest ability. They’re really not difficult, and in fact the black diamond rating is questionable, but they are certainly nice for high-speed cruising. On Saturday, the light was really flat, though (not to complain, it settled in and snowed quite hard, which we need), so prudence dictated holding your speed down, at least until you learn where the hazards lie. Adrenaline junkies can get their fix by hiking above the lifts into a series of chutes known as the Headwaters. Those will satisfy even the most hard-core of snowriders, and aren’t much short of vertical, with several boasting about a ski length of room to turn. The trail guide advises that self-rescue skills are mandatory for heading up there. It appears to me that if you lose it toward the top of those chutes, that mortuary services might be more in order! They weren’t open until we get some more snow (they got about a foot of fluff last night up there, though), but I’ll undoubtedly have to head up there and check out a couple of the somewhat less terrifying ones sometime this winter.

Another thing that impressed me was their environmental policies. Please bear with, as a bit of a history discourse is necessary to get a grasp of the situation. When the Northern Pacific railroad was built, starting in the 1860’s, Congress gave them ownership of every other section in a staggering portion of Montana. That remained the case in the Jack Creek drainage adjacent to Lone Mountain until the Lee Metcalf Wilderness was established. Obviously, the resulting checkerboard pattern of land ownership was unsuitable for that project, and public land ownership needed to be consolidated. By then, the Northern Pacific had morphed into Burlington Northern, and its timber subsidiary Plum Creek. The Forest Service swapped Plum Creek the FS sections in Jack Creek, in exchange for the Plum Creek sections in what are now the Spanish Peaks and Taylor/Hilgard portions of the Wilderness. I’m told by a former Forest Service landscape architect, who was involved in the negotiations, that unofficial assurance was granted that Plum Creek would not develop or sell off those lands. Just a couple of years later, though, after widespread clearcutting, they up and sold them to the partners of what has become Moonlight Basin, Inc.

That was widely condemned by a lot of folks, but I have come to the conclusion that while it would have been preferable to have Jack Creek wind up in public ownership, things sure could have turned out a lot worse. Most of the Moonlight Basin property has been placed in Conservation Easements that prohibit development. The areas that are being developed are clustered adjacent to Big Sky, and the remaining majority of the property is being managed (or rather, unmanaged) with a priority toward wildlife habitat. There are a couple of trail easements open to the public, and on several packtrips through the area last summer and fall, we saw abundant elk and deer, plus moose, and tracks of grizzly and black bear, mountain lion, and wolf. Yes, a significant portion of the area is comprised of recovering clearcuts, but the owners have thinned some of the doghair lodgepole stands, and there’s really a superb mosaic of meadows, mature timber, streams, and regrowth conifers that provide superb habitat. And no, aside from the trail easements, it’s not open for the public to run around willy-nilly on, but those trails access public land, and I tell ya, things could have turned out a lot worse.

Like an increasing number of high-end resorts, it’s obvious that the skiing operation will probably never be profitable. I’m sure it depends how you massage the numbers, but again, no expense was spared and the staff to client ratio is certainly not lacking. What’s paying the bills would appear to be real estate sales. Those prices are fairly stunning, ranging from about a half million for rustic ski-in & out cabins of some 800 square feet, up to multiple millions for penthouse suites and mansions. In fact, it appears to me the going rate is roughly a million per thousand square feet. A nice round number, eh?

Folks seem to be paying it, though. Twenty-five of those aforementioned cabins sold out in eighteen months, and that was before the ski area was even built. A few are up for re-sale, and I suppose if you pencil out having a property management firm offer them for vacation rentals, well…. Nah! Still no way it’s a money-maker for the owner, but I suppose it makes a nice tax write-off. As far as counting on appreciation to re-sell it at a profit? Maybe. Those prices already seem stratospheric to me, though, but it appears the market is bearing ‘em…. Planning on appreciation strains credibility, though, IMO.

Anyway, as their literature stresses, this is the "New West", and I guess that’s how it works. That may be the New West, but we feel that leading a packstring through the undeveloped portions of Moonlight Basin en route to say, Cedar Lake, is still the Real West. The fact those two scenarios can exist literally side by side strikes me as noteworthy indeed, and a tip of the hat goes to the owners.

This year my mood is vastly improved, though. Not only do we have a decent elk rack to add to our collection, and a bunch of superbly flavorful if stunning tough meat which I hope to finish processing later today, but my son is up at Big Sky checking out a reputed 18" snowpack. Last year as I recall, they were boasting a whopping six inches of natural snow, and local ski and snowboard base repair techs were gearing up for a surge in business! I am still viewing Big Sky’s snow reports with a jaundiced eye, after a reported six foot dump of powder last winter turned out to be more in the one foot range, but a remote SNOTEL site on Lone Mountain corroborated the 18" report. Incidentally, the National Weather Service has a page linking to remote weather sensing sites all over the state. It’s kind of cool to be able to see what the real-time conditions are in all sorts of fascinating spots that ordinarily require considerable effort to reach, from the comfort of home.

Here in southwest Montana, the mountain snowpack is off to a better start than last year (which isn’t necessarily saying much!), but in lower elevations it’s still noticeably bare. Western Montana has caught the bulk of the storms that have passed our way, though. A brief perusal of those SNOTEL sites up the Bitterroot, Sapphires, and assorted other locales in that vicinity show mountain snowpacks more in the two plus foot range. That translated into some noteworthy hunter success in the big game season just ended. In fact, according to FWP the number of harvested elk recorded at game check stations in the Missoula area was the highest since 1979, and the numbers at the Darby check station set an all-time record (dating back to 1953, when that station was established), at 727. Some other stats; hunter numbers at Region 2 check stations was up 12%, but the elk harvest was up a whopping 128%, to 1013 animals, mule deer up 48% to 567, and whitetails up 44% to 977.

In Region 4 (north central MT), 407 elk went through the Augusta check station, up nearly 78% from the ten-year average of 229. Mule deer harvest was also up significantly. Region 1 (northwest MT) reported 23,737 hunters collecting 1893 whitetails, 329 mulies, and 204 elk. Interestingly, of those whitetails, right at 2/3 were bucks, and 2/3 of those were four-point or better. All of those numbers are the highest recorded since the check stations were established. Note that these numbers only reflect folks that stopped at the game check stations, and the actual totals are without doubt significantly higher. Here in southwest Montana, the check stations are only open on weekends, and while they provide a reasonably reliable yardstick for comparison, the numbers are far from comprehensive.

The Cameron check station south of Ennis reported 182 elk, up from 158 in ’02. Further breakdown of those numbers shows 96 bulls and 86 cows (79 of each in ’02). Dissecting those numbers even further shows 49 of those bulls, and 53 of the cows coming from the Gravelly Range side of the Madison Valley. Oddly enough, last year 60 cows came from the Gravelly side. Fred King, FWP biologist and Man w/ the Plan for the Wall Creek Wildlife Management area, which provides winter range for much of the Gravellies, reported that elk seemed scarce to a lot folks the last few days of the season on Wall Creek. This past Monday morning he was glassing from the highway, and counted some 400 elk that had quite literally appeared out of the woodwork, including several dandy bulls. I swear, those elk must have calendars, as they seem to know when hunting season ends with uncanny precision!

I stopped in the Gallatin check station last Sunday afternoon. At that point there were a few hours left in the season, but they were reporting 130 elk and 20 deer. One of those deer was a dandy 170 B & C buck collected by my dentist, Dan Spain, & it couldn’t happen to a nicer guy! The upper Gallatin is not particularly noted as a trophy muley hotspot, further evidence that anomalies exist when it comes to game populations and their pursuit, and that statistics can be meaningless if you happen to be at the right spot at the right time.

With that said, I’ll attempt to warm the hearts of statistics professors everywhere by noting that the Gallatin elk harvest numbers, by weekend, went 32, 35, 25, 14, 14, and 10. Once again, those are not comprehensive. I have an unofficial report that around 50 antlerless elk were harvested on the Flying D Ranch alone, the last Saturday of the season. Obviously, those were not included in the totals, for reasons unknown, but that’s a pretty decent one-day take on cow elk. Incidentally, the Flying D is a shining example of wildlife management, IMO. They’ve managed to keep their elk numbers around 2500 (no small feat, as that place is a veritable elk factory). In the process, they’ve substantially improved their bull:cow ratio to nearly 50/50, as well as maintaining an age structure surpassing even places like Yellowstone Park. I have their wildlife reports here, and could absolutely bore you to tears with the numbers. I’ll refrain, but if you’re interested drop us a line.

So, with hunting season ended, I am jonesing hard for some backcountry skiing, but fortunately from a work standpoint temptation is minimal. By the time a big snow dump comes down the pike my pile of neglected bookwork should be reduced to manageable levels, and I’ll be able to break out the Alpine Touring gear without any nagging sense of guilt. In the meanwhile, if you happen to be one of the many who were inexplicably unable to contribute to the hunting success stats, remember all is not lost on the freezer filling front, as we will gladly set you up with a buffalo. There’s nothing quite like curling up under a toasty buffalo robe on cold winter nights, and drifting off with dreams of sugarplummed statisticians nimbly negotiating the nuances of numbing numbers.