Score Change: Snow King Sees The Most Radical Transformation of a Ski Resort in Years
Jackson, Wyoming’s Snow King mountain sees major changes to its PeakRankings Mountain Score thanks to extraordinary lift, terrain, and signage upgrades for the 2021-22 season.
For the 2021-22 season, Snow King experienced one of the most incredible revamps of any ski area in recent memory. The small Wyoming resort, which is just south of much-better-known Jackson Hole, replaced its base-to-summit Summit Double chair with its first high-speed lift, the 8-passenger Snow King Gondola. On top of that, the resort expanded its lift-serviced terrain by adding the new Sunnyside triple chair, which services the mountain’s back side and provides access to select expert lines that used to require a hike to reach. This past winter, we went back to check out the transformed experience.
Mountain Experience Changes
The Snow King Gondola is clearly the biggest improvement of all the investments put forth this winter. As a result of this investment, the base-to-summit ride has evolved from a slow, safety-bar-less chairlift ride to a modern, comfortable gondola journey. The new ride is nearly twice as fast as the old double and a lot more inviting for less-experienced visitors.
The gondola’s biggest drawback is that guests must now remove their equipment to ride the lift. Given the resort’s short vertical drop and lack of base-to-summit lift alternatives, this can get repetitive and annoying; however, even with time allotted for equipment removal, traveling up the gondola is still considerably faster than the old double.
Snow King’s beginner experience has improved quite a bit as a result of this expansion. The new Way Home trail is a much better top-to-bottom green run than the outgoing Slow Trail, offering a generally mellower pitch and fewer flat sections than the old setup (the Slow Trail still exists unofficially, although it has technically been decommissioned above the Cougar Triple chair). The Way Home run passes along the top of the Rafferty chair, making this lift fully accessible to beginners for the first time. In addition, the new summit learning zone provides a more distinctive first-time environment than the previous bunny hill, which was surrounded by parking lots and discontinuous from the rest of the resort.
However, beginner terrain is still generally limited. Only five green trails exist outside the bunny hill area, and none of Snow King’s greens lead back to the main base, making the Rafferty chair the only lappable area for beginners. It would have been nice to see a beginner route back to the gondola paired with these other updates.
Snow King’s new learning zone, located at the top of the Snow King Gondola, features two magic carpets and is much more picturesque than the old bunny hill.
Snow King’s intermediate experience has seen a boost thanks to the Sunnyside backside expansion, which brings new intermediate bowl terrain (the area was technically in-bounds prior to the 2021-22 season, but it did not have any lift service or trail markings, making it effectively unsuitable for resort visitors). However, the back side has a huge catch—it faces south, meaning it doesn’t hold snow very well. The backside experience can be quite variable; snow retention across the south-facing zone is disappointing, with the area relying on snowmaking to avoid bare cover and regularly closing large sections of the bowl. Conditions-wise, the back side looks more like something you’d expect from an average East Coast mountain than a Rockies destination.
A lot has changed at Snow King with these updates, but the resort still maintains the same general vibe as the old mountain. Despite the new buildup, the resort still retains the local town hill feel it has historically exhibited. Perhaps part of the reason for that is that these upgrades haven’t resulted in a major uptick in crowds—or at least one large enough to generate memorable lines. The capacity of the new Snow King Gondola isn’t actually that much higher than the old double chair, but in today’s world, it doesn’t really need to be.
Snow King’s south-facing Sunnyside back side in March 2022. During this below-average day, the ground was almost completely bare outside of snowmaking areas.
Mountain Score Impacts
Snow King sees multiple boosts to its PeakRankings Mountain Score as a result of these changes. The gondola and backside triple installations have been so critical to the resort experience that we are increasing the resort’s Lifts score by an unprecedented three points, from a 2 to a 5. The new signage has had quite an effect as well, and while there are still some areas for improvement, we are increasing Snow King’s Navigation score by a whopping two points, from a 5 to a 7. However, we have also made the decision to decrease Snow King’s Resiliency score by a point due to the variability of the new back side expansion.
The resort also sees a few Mountain Score shifts due to category recalibrations on our end, rather than changes directly related to investments from this past season. We’re adjusting our Terrain Diversity category to better reflect shortcomings in certain terrain categories (the full overhaul will be released in the coming days), and we have made the decision to keep Snow King’s Terrain Diversity score at a 4—rather than increasing it to a 5—due to its small footprint and limited terrain. In addition, Snow King’s Mountain Aesthetic score sees a one-point shift from an 8 to a 7 as part of a broader category revamp detailed here.
Despite a considerable three-point Mountain Score increase, Snow King faces stiff competition from larger Rocky Mountain destinations and retains its ranking as 24th in the Rockies. However, the resort has leapfrogged ahead of several resorts in other regions and now ranks 41st overall—up five spots from its previous position.
For more on Snow King, check out our full Snow King mountain review and our Rockies resort rankings.
Snow King Score Change
7
Previous Resiliency Score
6
New Resiliency Score
2
Previous Lifts Score
5
New Lifts Score
5
Previous Navigation Score
7
New Navigation Score
8
Previous Mountain Aesthetic Score
7
New Mountain Aesthetic Score
57
Previous Overall Score
60
New Overall Score
