Snowmobile-accessed Ski Touring in Idaho, Wyoming & Montana

Where to go snowmobile-accessed ski touring

Many of the popular ski towns out west—Aspen, Telluride, Jackson, Park City, Truckee, and Bozeman, to name a few—have vast stretches of private land, protected wilderness areas, and very few sled access roads and routes. Despite being the shortlist of iconic ski destinations with world-class resorts, they surprisingly aren’t the best for sled-to-ski trips, like ours. So, we started a new list.

The places we visited were much farther off the beaten path. Our first destination was in Stanley, ID, on the edge of the Sawtooth Mountains. From there we traveled to Pinedale, WY, to visit the Wind Rivers, then to the sled mecca of Cooke City, MT, near the Beartooths. After, we drove north in Montana to Whitefish, just minutes from the Canadian border, before detouring to Halfway, OR, to visit an old stomping ground—the lesser-known Wallowa Range.

Upon reflection, there’s not much about our route we would change. Perhaps a little more time at each stop, if we could afford that time away from home. Each destination offered its own perks, from epic burned tree skiing in Idaho and pillows in Cooke to alpine lines in northern Montana.

When to go snowmobile-accessed ski touring

A big trip of this nature may appear to take months of planning, if not more. Between work, family obligations, birthdays, weddings, and holidays, PTO is at a premium for nearly all of us. Fortunately, a road trip offers an antidote: flexibility. Despite the copious time we spent researching the route, we left home with only half of our days planned in detail, leaving the rest to be decided by the weather gods.