The Aspen-ization of Jackson Hole?

What a difference a decade makes. More than 10 years ago, I skied Jackson Hole (“skied” is probably too strong a word; “survived” is more like it), which had a reputation as one of the toughest ski areas in the country. The tram to the top of the mountain had all the ambience of a New York subway car, the windchill made the temperature feel like zero, the overcast skies prevented me from seeing much beyond my own breath, and the fear factor ranked right up there with skydiving.

This year, I returned to find a rejuvenated, skier-friendly resort, with groomed runs, a brand-new, comfortable gondola to speed me most of the way toward the top, restaurants in the town of Jackson--12 miles from the Jackson Hole ski resort--that rival those in Aspen, and beautiful, calm, sunny days.

Jackson Hole means, literally, Jackson Valley, named after David E. Jackson, a trapper who helped establish the Rocky

Mountain Fur Co. in the early 1800s. Fur trappers of the last century often referred to mountain-ringed valleys as “holes.”

So what happened in the years since my first visit? An infusion of money, for one thing. The resort had been built by California businessman Paul McCollister, one of the last of the old-time American ski entrepreneurs. The new owner, John “Jay” Kemmerer (whose family founded Wyoming’s Kemmerer Coal Co.), took over in 1992, installed Aspen veteran Jerry Blann as president and has begun $14 million in improvements.

They can’t do much about the weather--I guess in late January I just got lucky. But they could, and did, change skiing habits by building the eight-passenger Bridger gondola, which made its debut in November. It starts near the tram, then climbs through a windless gully to a point just below the head wall, a set of cliffs. Thus the new gondola can transport large numbers of skiers up 2,730 feet of vertical rise in 7 1/2 minutes even on blustery days when winds force the tram to a halt. A few paces from its launch pad is the new Bridger Center, a skier services building with a child-care facility and a huge rental and retail store. There are ski “hosts” at the bottom of the hill every morning and at the top of both the gondola and the tram every hour to help you find the best runs.

Of course, some things don’t change. This is still Jackson Hole, the place for guys to practice their machismo. (The skiing population is 70% male.) Experts still flock here to jump, literally, into Corbet’s Couloir--a notoriously narrow, steep chute that weaves through rocks near the top of the tram--and then brag about it the rest of the winter.

It is said that no less a figure than former astronaut and U.S. Sen. John Glenn (D-Ohio) admitted his fear of heights when he peered over the edge of Corbet’s, although he did ski the rest of the mountain. Jackson’s ski ambassador is Tommy Moe, the American 1994 Olympic gold downhiller. The resort once employed renowned extreme skier Doug Coombs as an ambassador, the equivalent of letting a fox into the henhouse; Coombs skied out of bounds one too many times and was banished.

In nearby Jackson, the centerpiece of the town square is still an arch of antlers. The Million Dollar Cowboy Bar still has saddles for stools, although you are more likely to meet trophy cowboys--part-time ranchers who hold day jobs as executives of multinational corporations--than real ones. (They also are as likely as not to be married. This is a classic “guys’ week” resort, the kind that draws groups of men without their wives.) Most important, the backdrop is still the Tetons, the most starkly beautiful of all Rocky Mountain ranges. Grand Teton National Park--where you can cross-country ski in blissful silence while the deer and the antelope play--is a short ride away.

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I arrived with a friend too late at night to glimpse the Tetons rising precipitously from the plains. But it was just as well, because it whetted our anticipation. The Jackson Hole Airport (actually in Grand Teton National Park) is north of the town of Jackson, where many of the less expensive accommodations are. Teton Village, at the base of the ski resort, is a 40-minute ride from the airport. We had booked an apartment--one of the handful of places located in Teton Village--so we could walk to the lifts. The facade of the village had hardly changed: wood A-frame buildings from the late 1960s. The Mangy Moose saloon, a classic skiers’ hangout where quantity triumphs over quality, still sits directly in the middle of things.

The next morning, we awoke to a familiar sight--falling snow. In earlier winters, I had never seen the views from the top of the tram because it was always snowing. Our first day at the “new” Jackson Hole, however, was to be different, as were the next four. I opted for seats in the gondola instead of standing in the tram, and we ascended right through the layer of low clouds into bright sunlight. As I stepped into my skis, I looked down on an opaque ocean of gray that obscured views of the base village and town, but not the ski trails below us. There was a dusting of fresh snow on the slopes, yet I needed to switch from goggles to sunglasses.

A friend who lives in Jackson was showing me around that first morning. “I don’t want to get into anything too difficult on my first day,” I said nervously. “Don’t worry, we’ll just cruise over to the Thunder lift and ski the nice, wide-open runs,” she assured me. We slid through a cluster of trees to a broad boulevard named Amphitheater. Along one side was a tubular groove for snowboarders. (There is a second half-pipe, as such grooves are called, at the other end of the ski mountain.) Soon we were aboard Thunder, a four-person quad, heading even farther uphill.

For the rest of the morning, we explored what seemed like miles of intermediate and upper-intermediate slopes, nicely interconnected by traverses and three other surface lifts. At lunchtime, my friend left me at the base area, pointing me toward the Village Cafe. “A very hip little place,” she announced. Indeed, the stools were occupied by cool young snowboard dudes, and it served Starbucks coffee along with mouthwatering fresh pastries and pizza slices.

During the next several days, I explored as many runs as I could, including those accessed from the top of the tram. The steeps and the cliffs here have made Jackson a magnet for experts, and even some of the intermediate slopes have thigh-burning pitches. This ain’t no Snowmass; this ain’t no Heavenly; this ain’t no fooling around. The S and S Couloir (regarded as tougher than Corbet’s), Alta Chutes, Expert Chutes, Central Chutes below Cheyenne Bowl, the Hobacks and many other black or double-black advanced runs reached from the tram will humble even an experienced skier. Jackson holds three special “Steep Camps” each winter for advanced skiers.

Even its one Women’s Camp, a four-day clinic held each January, is not for sissies. My traveling companion, who attended the camp, was very impressed by the fact that the instructors pushed their clients rather than catering to them--an attitude she had found at women’s-only clinics elsewhere. “They challenge you without intimidating you,” she said of the Jackson clinic her first day. By Day Four, she was ecstatic. “You wouldn’t believe how much I’ve improved,” she said, having been taken through mogul fields and advanced runs.

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Jackson rewards its visitors in many ways. First come the views--the tops of all the Teton peaks can be glimpsed as you exit the tram. Then comes the length. With a base altitude of 6,311 feet and a top of 10,450, Jackson features one of the longest drops of any ski area in the country. Intermediates can follow the signposts from the tram across a wide traverse above Rendezvous Bowl onto the upper-intermediate Rendezvous Trail without having heart failure, and then pursue acres of wide bowls, bumps and trees, many of them linked by a traverse called South Pass. Part of the fun is finding a guide who will show you secret spots not listed on the trail map, like Broken Goggles, Toilet Bowl and Egg Carton.

Thanks to the gondola, skiers and snowboarders can play yo-yo on a huge scale, zipping up to the head wall and then descending all the way to the base in a matter of minutes. Because weather inversion is common, the upper mountain is often warmer than the lower portion. For beginners and lower intermediates, there’s an area served by Teewinot, the mountain’s lone high-speed quad chair, and the ancient, slow Apres Vous double chair (due to be replaced this summer), which offers pleasantly gentle runs.

My friend and I were tuckered out after our first day, so we opted to eat in the Alpenhof, one of the base village’s original hotels. The food was a throwback to the good old days--filling Austrian dishes including wiener schnitzel, Tyrolean chicken and the like.

On subsequent nights, we made forays by bus into town, about a 30-minute ride costing $2 each way. We sampled what might be called Jackson chic--dinner at two highly regarded restaurants, the log cabin-style Snake River Grill and The Range--where un-Wyoming words like chipotle butter and arugula appear on the menu and where a venison chop might be served with balsamic roast onions, bacon, squash and sweet potato puree. Both restaurants are splendid, with Aspen-like prices. For apres-ski or apres dinner drinking and dancing, the Cowboy Bar often has a live band, and the Art Deco Cadillac Grille next door has a huge beer list.

The “Aspenization” of Jackson is a sore point with Wyomingites, especially those who call themselves SLs--seasonal locals. These folks insist they have bought second homes or moved permanently to the town for its Western quality, not its glitz. The truth is that for half a century Jackson has been a tourist gateway to Grand Teton and Yellowstone national parks. Quaint it ain’t.

Today, there are dozens of neon-lit motels, restaurants and shops beyond the boardwalks of the old western core of Jackson. Yes, there are branches of The Gap and Ralph Lauren, and celebrity sightings. (Harrison Ford, a fittingly rugged hero, owns a place here.) There also are the wonderful Valley Bookstore, art galleries and a museum of wildlife art, in addition to dozens of tchotchke and T-shirt shops. New condo communities have been built, some only a short shuttle-bus ride from the lifts.

More lodging is planned in Teton Village in addition to the hotels already in place. One, the Sojourner Inn, already has been gussied up, with its name changed to the Best Western Resort at Jackson Hole. A huge stuffed buffalo stands just inside the entrance, reminding visitors that this is Wyoming, a state that’s never met an animal it couldn’t kill.

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What is unique about this ski town is that it shares its neighborhood with an attraction no other American ski resort can match: Grand Teton National Park, about five miles north of Jackson. More than 35 years ago Olaus Murie, a Norwegian field biologist who moved to Jackson in 1927 with his wife, Margaret, wrote: “As one drives into and out of the town of Jackson . . . passing through an unsightly parade of billboards that scar the charming scenery, one cannot help but breathe a sigh of gratitude after crossing the park boundary to find a quiet and serene landscape, marred only by a too-modern highway.”

In winter, that highway is closed to traffic just beyond the park visitor center at Moose. The quiet and serenity has not changed since Olaus Murie’s time. On our final day, my friend and I experienced it by signing up at the Teton Village Nordic Center for a cross-country tour. When we began skiing at 10 a.m., fog obscured the mountains and snow was filling in tracks made by skiers the day before. Along with our guide, Scott Courser, who has a degree in resource management and who works in the park in the summer, we were the sole human visitors in sight. The only sound was the crunch of our skis through the snow.

Gradually the snow stopped, its fog began to lift, and the white, lightly forested expanse teased us with peeks of the granite skyline towering above us. As we glided north through stands of spruce, fir, aspens and cottonwood trees toward frozen Jenny Lake, Scott noted the faint animal tracks in the snow, told us how bears hibernated and moose foraged in the cold, and spoke of the geologic upheavals that formed this majestic place. We paused in a clearing to eat sandwiches and sip cocoa.

On cue, the sun broke through and the Tetons revealed themselves in all their abrupt splendor, no foothills concealing their lower ridges, their flanks lined with glaciers, their jagged edges more reminiscent of the Himalayas or the Alps than of the rest of the Rockies. We tared, awe-struck. The Tetons were the first high peaks I, a city girl, ever saw; their majesty still moves me to tears.

“Jackson Hole is not merely a sky-piercing range of mountains for tourists to aim their cameras at,” wrote Olaus Murie, whose wife, known as Mardy, still lives in Moose. “It is a country with a spirit.” A lot has changed at Jackson Hole, but the spirit is alive and well.

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GUIDEBOOK

The Hole Story

Getting there: There’s connecting service only from LAX to Jackson Hole, on Delta and United. Round-trip fares start at about $290 including tax.

Packages: For March (high season through March 21) and April (lifts close April 12) it’s wise to look into deals that include air fare, lodging and lift tickets. For example, Jackson Hole Central Reservations offers a package valid March 2-April 12 for $429 per person that includes four nights’ lodging, three days’ lift tickets, and round trip air fare from LAX. The lodging is at one of three hotels in Jackson or the Best Western Inn at Jackson Hole in Teton Village. Telephone: (800) 443-6931. (Another organization, Jackson Hole Reservations, offers comparable packages; tel. (800) 329-9205; Web site: www.jacksonholeres.com.)

Jackson Hole Central Reservations will customize packages to suit. When I asked about family accommodations, they put together a package of four nights in a two-bedroom condo at the Jackson Hole Racquet Club (five miles from the lifts--free shuttle available), three days’ lift tickets, airport transfers and round-trip air fare for four people, for $604 per person.

We got our package from Moguls Ski and Snowboard Tours (Boulder, Colo.; tel. (800) 666-4857), which we located through the Web site: www.iski.com.

Where to stay: Staying at the base of the lifts in Teton Village is the most convenient plan, while staying in or around Jackson is likely to be cheaper. Among Teton Village choices: the Alpenhof, tel. (800) 732-3244, $164 double; the Best Western Resort at Jackson Hole (formerly the Sojourner), tel. (800) 445-4655, $145 double.

In Jackson, typical motel-style choices include: the Antler Inn ($66 double) and Elk Country Inn ($72 double), tel. (800) 4-TETONS for both; Days Inn ($89 double), tel. (800) DAYS-INN or (307) 733-0033; and Best Western Lodge at Jackson Hole ($129 double), tel. (800) 458-3866.

For more information: Jackson Hole Mountain Resort, main switchboard, tel. (307) 733-2292, fax (307) 733-2660.