It’s that time of year again.  The aspens and cottonwoods are turning and a golden hue lines the creeks and mountainsides.  I love this time of year with the cool mornings and bluebird afternoons.  The changing colors have been particularly good this year.  Throw in a few days that have also had snow-capped peaks and it doesn’t get much better.…

We have such a nice backdrop to the ski area with the high peaks of the Sawatch Range towering above.

The following is a guest post from Randy Stroud, GM/COO Leave a comment here. As of Friday September 22, 2023 we have officially started the approval process for the project that has been top of mind for all of you … the No Name Basin terrain expansion project. The Master Development Plan that was accepted by the Forest Service back…

The official “Notice of Proposed Action” for the No Name Basin – Ski Area Terrain Expansion has been published by the USFS.  This proposal aims to add 377 acres of lift-served skiing to the Monarch Mountain experience.  For more information on the proposed project and to make comments on it, please visit the USFS SOPA page at this link.

We recently added another vault toilet up in the north end of the Paradise Lot.  This new improvement should come in handy for our coffee infused guests as they arrive at the ski area this winter!

As described in an earlier post, the local crew from Terra Firma Forestry has been busy clearing the small dead standing trees out along Mirkwood Ridge.  The trees are not being removed but we are instead utilizing a lop and scatter technique.  This involves cutting the trees into smaller pieces and scattering them out on the forest floor.  This is…

We picked up our first snow of the season today.  The cold front moved in overnight and gave us a little taste of winter.  It looks to warm up over the weekend so this snow won’t last for long.  I know it’s only mid-September but it sure gets us thinking about skiing and riding!

One of our original lifts at Monarch was a T-Bar that topped out near what is now the top of the Little Joe ski trail.  This Contstam T-Bar had previously been used at the Tenderfoot Ski Area near the town of Victor, CO and was purchased by Monarch in 1957.  The foundations from this lift can still be seen along…

As you know, parking and shuttling has taken on a more important role in the Colorado ski industry over the last five to ten years. Even for the classic and smaller ski area operations like Monarch. What can I say? People just love to ski! As a business, we also have focused more on helping to get our workforce up…

Here is a look up from the bottom of Mirkwood. It’s deep with a mix of wildflowers and skunk cabbage right now. While we are addressing the smaller standing dead spruce trees in the Basin this summer, it’s clear to see that we still have some larger trees to deal with at some point in the future.