Discovery Basin Montana — Mens Adventure Travel

Amazing Discovery Basin Montana

There are number of ski areas in the world that are perfectly named. Sun Valley is one. Snow Bird is another. There is Mammoth--the U.S. equivalent to Chamonix’s Grands Montets. And then there is Discovery Basin. Aside from the obvious difference in scale, this southwest Montana resort will either take your breath way or make you yell “Getalong Little Doggies!” “Ride-em Cowboy!”“Yipi Ti Yay!” or whatever else the local cowboys, cum ex-copper smelters cough up when they’ve had one to many, or drive into the front of their boots. Studying “Terminator’s” killer pitch through my ski tips, I don’t feel like yelling. I do, however, whisper, “God this is steep!”

The trail map doesn’t help.

“CAUTION!” it warns. “The extreme terrain served by this lift is very steep, unpredictable and ungroomed. There are many obstacles, rocks, cliffs, old fallen trees and snags.” If that isn’t enough it then adds, “You must know how to self arrest!”

Robbie Hillard, Russ Squire Discovery Montana

Russ Squire “Bad Finger run” Discovery Basin

Despite these prohibitions (or perhaps because of them) this large, north facing bowl makes friends Robbie Hilliard and Russ Squire chomp at the bit. An excitable boy who recently set the world twelve hour vertical record in Big Sky Montana, Squire jumps in, explodes the first bump and with pumping knees and flicking poles disappears in a crystal cloud. A second later Hilliard attacks the good right line next to the trees. Seen from above, they resemble a couple of grade schoolers banging out a furious, discordant melody on a white grand piano.

Discovery’s vital statistics do not do the resort justice. It skis far bigger, steeper, longer and better laid out than its vertical drop of thirteen hundred feet and three hundred and sixty acres serviced by three fixed grip doubles and one triple lift. It also profits from incredible snow and a colorful history. Discovery bought the Limelight lift from Sun Valley where it was once used to service Bald Mountain’s north side. The resurrected version may be a thousand feet shorter, but it still rises up Limelight where locals rage beneath the loaded chairs.

It would be a mistake, however, to define Discovery simply by its chutes, bumps and glades. The south facing front side that rises above the base lodge offers wide, groomed intermediate runs of “Claimjumper,” “Sapphire” and “Southern Cross” while beginners will love the gentle “Red Lion” and “Gold Bug.”

Other than Anaconda, the historic smelter town that sits twenty miles down Highway 1, Discovery isn’t especially close to anything.

Russ Squire “Bad Finger” View of Back Bowls

Named after a mining strike in the high bowls that rise to the northwest of the resort base and financed by a group of Spokane doctors, Discovery Basin opened in 1973.

Ninety miles from Missoula, ninety from Helena and forty-five from Butte, though daylight speed limits on the Montanabahns can cut these distances to dramatically less than a mile a minute, the resort is rarely crowded.

Montana’s economic depression, however, savaged skier numbers and when the Small Business Administration foreclosed eleven years later, Peter Pitcher flew his small Cessna up to Philipsburg, a collection of summer cabins and small stores located six miles down the road. His introduction to Discovery was less than inspiring.

“The ski area was pretty dismal,” Pitcher remembers. “The lodge roof leaked badly and there were problems with the main Green Chair compounded by a lack of maintenance on the Blue and Black lifts.” Pitcher, however, fell in love with Montana and together with his Columbian born wife Beatriz bought Discovery from the SBA in 1984.

The depression, however, only deepened. Pitcher remembers “When the smelter closed in Anaconda, someone put up a sign that said, ‘Will the last person to leave town, turn out the lights?” The son of Kingsford Pitcher who made a name for himself as an Aspen ski instructor and now owns Wolfcreek Ski Area, Peter didn’t leave, but in those first desperate years, the couple didn’t make any money either. In this gorgeous but hard scrabble section of Montana, surrounding ski areas fight for every skier day. And, to make matters worse, a drought settled over the Northwest. One result was, in 1985 the resort sold less than 20,000 tickets.

Anaconda was once a major copper smelting center that still bears the brick, copper and Victorian architecture remnants of a 19th century boom and bust. The world’s largest smelter stack, which rises 585 feet over massive heaps of black slag, took 6.5 million bricks to build and can be seen from miles away. And in the historic district, the brick Daly Bank, Montana Hotel, City Hall and dozens of Victorian homes, evoke the city’s riotous, rich, halcyon past.

Somehow the Pitchers stuck it out and, due in large part to the added expert terrain, a $22 dollar lift ticket, as well as improvements in the lifts, lodge and services, skier numbers climbed to 60,000 in 1999. Today Discovery is a classic mom and pop resort where Peter, Beatriz and their sons Allesandro, Carl and Siche unload freight, sell tickets, man the cash register, flip burgers, bus tables and, when they find a spare moment, sneak away to board the backside’s incredible glades and chutes

A visit to Anaconda’s Chamber of Commerce will provide information about the local Jack Nicklaus golf course, historic tours and the improving economic picture, but if you really want to find about this town, you need to drop by the bar of the same name.

Located on Main Street, close to the old historic district, on a typical Thursday night, the Anaconda bar is filled with a dozen locals belting back Drivers, Ditches, shooters, beer backs and other no nonsense working man drinks. Except Thursday is ladies night and most show the effects of a wild youth, hard rock marriages and too much overtime. Among the men eying the gals, “Renegade,” who is friendly to a fault, could use a front bridge and a strong dose of thorazine. But then, no one is perfect, and after three days at Discovery and Anaconda and a few beers with the gals, even I begin to yearn for a return to the glory days when the stack blew gasses, the copper kings reigned and a fat paycheck greased Friday night.