"It was a great year to be an upside-down mountain, and we could ski the top half." That is how Blacktail Mountain Ski Area General Manager Jessi Wood summed up the 2025-26 season to the Flathead Beacon last March.
The quote explains how Lakeside's home hill starts its winter. Blacktail's parking lot and lodge sit at the 6,780-foot summit, 14 miles up Blacktail Road from town, and the hill runs entirely on natural snow. The snow arrives at the top first, so the skiing does too, and opening day follows the snow rather than the calendar. As of late October, Blacktail has not announced an opening date for 2026-27. The one decision a skier controls right now is when to buy a pass, and Blacktail changed how that works this year.
Five Seasons, Five Different Opening Days
Recent history shows how far opening day can move. Here are the last five opening days, taken from Blacktail's own announcements and Flathead Beacon coverage:
| Season | Opening day | Context |
|---|---|---|
| 2021-22 | Dec. 17 | Lifts announced to begin spinning that Friday |
| 2022-23 | Saturday, Dec. 10 | Called the earliest opening in 10 years |
| 2023-24 | Sunday, Jan. 14 | Opened on a settled 16-inch base with limited terrain |
| 2024-25 | Friday, Dec. 13 | Kicked off with the annual "Wake Up Old Man Winter" party |
| 2025-26 | Wednesday, Dec. 24 | Opened top half only after weeks of delays |
Over five seasons the earliest and latest openings are five weeks apart. In three of the five years the lifts started between Dec. 10 and Dec. 17. The other two openings came on Christmas Eve and in mid-January, so the middle of December is the usual pattern, though nothing guarantees it.
Blacktail doesn't publish a snow-depth threshold for opening. Its 2025 pre-season update said only that the mountain was committed to opening "as soon as possible." The 16-inch base reported on opening day in January 2024 describes that one day. Blacktail doesn't present it as a target.
How Last December's Opening Kept Slipping
The 2025-26 start shows how the date moves in real time. Blacktail first planned to open Friday, Dec. 12, then moved its target to Friday, Dec. 19, "conditions permitting." A December windstorm then caused a multi-day power outage, and the Flathead Beacon reported that lifts would start on Christmas Eve.
Snow wasn't the only cause of the delay. The outage also cost the mountain days. A Flathead National Forest project now addresses that weak point. The Forest Service authorized a 366-acre vegetation treatment along the Blacktail powerline corridor to reduce tree-related outages, and its release last December said work was expected to begin in 2026.
The Top Half Carried the Whole Winter
When the lifts did start on Christmas Eve, a recent storm had left just enough snow to open, and staff could run only the top half of the 1,000-acre hill because coverage on the lower mountain was thin.
The rest of the winter followed the same pattern. According to the Beacon's March report, a December atmospheric river brought record precipitation that fell as rain at all but the highest elevations. January then went dry. Summit snow depth reached roughly 30 inches in early January and stayed near that level for much of the season, while rain and wind forced occasional closures.
Wood told the Beacon the lower half was open for only one full weekend all season, when a mid-March storm let staff run the hill from top to bottom. "We had this huge powder weekend, and it turned around and rained on us," she said.
A conventional ski area with its base at the bottom would have struggled to open at all that winter. Blacktail's layout put its parking lot, lodge and best snow at the same elevation. Even so, it closed Saturday, March 28, about a week ahead of Whitefish Mountain Resort's April 5 closing day. It went out with the second annual TeleFestivus and the Mama Mingo Day closing-day tradition, which comes with a flamingo scavenger hunt.
What the Forecast Can and Can't Say About This Winter
NOAA's U.S. Winter Outlook, released Oct. 15, 2026, expects El Niño to shape December 2026 through February 2027. It gives the Pacific Northwest and northern Rockies some of the best odds in the country for a warmer-than-average winter. The precipitation map favors drier-than-average conditions in parts of the northern Rockies and northern Mountain West.
That outlook leans away from snow at lower elevations. It gives no snowfall total, though. NOAA says its seasonal outlooks don't project snowfall because snow generally can't be predicted more than a week ahead. The next three-month update is due Nov. 19. For Blacktail, a warm winter puts more weight on the summit-first layout that carried last season. The upper mountain and the lodge are where the season is likeliest to start, and the lower runs are likeliest to wait.
Pass Prices Now Rise by Tier, Not by Deadline
This is the part of opening day a skier can plan. Blacktail's 2026/27 season pass page says "old dates & deadlines are gone." Each discount level has a limited number of passes, and the price goes up when a level sells out. Current prices, with ages as of Dec. 1, 2026:
- Adult, 25-69: $499
- Young Adult, 18-24: $399
- Teen, 13-17: $329
- Child, 8-12: $119
- Tot, 7 and under, and 5th Grade: $10
- Senior, 70+: $149
Some of the gaps are large. A child's pass costs $210 less than a teen's, and the senior pass costs less than a third of the adult price. For the 2025-26 opener, Blacktail listed a $75 adult day ticket, with $10 off for buying online in advance. At that rate, the current $499 adult pass would have paid for itself on the seventh day of skiing. Blacktail hasn't posted 2026-27 day-ticket prices yet, so the math will change once those rates are out.
The ticketing system changed too. Last March, Blacktail moved to a new system with RFID cards and asked guests and passholders to exchange their cards at the lodge ticket office on their first visit.
What Runs at the Summit Once It Opens
Blacktail runs three chairlifts and a surface conveyor and averages about 250 inches of snow a year. Its lodge has three food spots, Muley's Bar & Grill, Mighty Bites Cafeteria and Blacktail Bean Coffee Shop. Last season the regular schedule was Wednesday through Sunday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., with seven-day operations over the Christmas holiday. The ski area hasn't confirmed this winter's hours yet.
Families can already plan the programs. Blacktail's snowsports school lists 2027 multi-week youth programs by name: Alpine Bambis, Alpine and Snowboard Young Fawns, Alpine and Snowboard Blacktails, Young Bucks, and Cadets. The Bigfork Eagle reported last March that the Montana Alpine Race School has trained at Blacktail for 10 years, with youth, adult masters and Rockets programming on weekdays and weekends.
The Blacktail Mountain X-Country trails are separate from the downhill area, and volunteers with the North Shore Nordic Club maintain them.
The 14 Miles Between Lakeside and the Lifts
Every Blacktail day starts with the drive up Blacktail Road from Lakeside, about 14 miles to the parking lot at the top. On its snow and ice removal page, Flathead County says its crews don't maintain roads to bare pavement. Snow operations may start at 5:30 or 7:30 a.m., and conditions vary during and after storms. The county asks drivers to slow down, leave extra travel time and give plows room. Montana's Department of Transportation separately explains when chains may be required on highway sections it designates and signs.
If you're weighing a home in the Lakeside area and want to know how winter actually works up Blacktail Road, I'm happy to talk through it with you. Montana winters are part of what I love about living here, and I'd like to help you plan for them. Let's Connect with Heidi Lane.
