The Best Backcountry Skiing Routes in Oregon

Glade Trail is a low-angle, wide-cut trail through the forest between Government Camp and Timberline Lodge. It’s most popular with snowshoers and cross-country skiers because of the easy gradient, but makes a good ski tour for anyone seeking a long but mellow route....

The Windsor Chairline is an obvious black diamond-rated run directly below the Windsor Chair. This popular run is relatively straightforward, with ripples in the landscape early in the season that lend to air opportunities....

Birnam Wood serves as Brutus's counterpart near the Ariel lift, providing one of the two best glades on Mt. Ashland. Even though Birnam is located off of the expert-only Ariel lift, this glade features more widely-spaced trees even than Brutus, and according to FATMAP it only hits a max gradient of 27°....

The Coolwater Glade offers widely-spaced trees on a moderate grade. Dropping off of and returning to Dream, this aspect of the mountain can receive good sunlight during mid-day. While this can sometimes make the pow sun-affected, if the conditions were quite hard early in the morning, the sunlight can help soften the surface up....

Titus is an often-overlooked glade that lies several runs to skier's right of the top of the Windsor Lift. While most of the skier traffic from Windsor is focused on the Windsor Chairline or Brutus, Titus tends to be bypassed, offering some great pow turns....

The trees to skier's right of the Ariel Chairline provide a mixed bag of glade choices. It takes a bit of work to string together the patches of trees together, but the intrepid skier can often score great pow turns in these trees long after the Chairline is tracked out....

The Moraine Glade is the most difficult glade on Mt. Ashland to access and return from, meaning that it often holds great snow even late on a powder day. To access Moraine, the bowl terrain first needs to be opened by ski patrol....

Upper Winter is a wide but short glade dropping off of the Upper Balcony. There's an obvious, widely-spaced line through the center of the glade that offers easy, fun turns. To either side of the wide line, the trees are more tightly-spaced but are still navigable....

Mt. Hood Skibowl allows uphill travel on this designated route from the West Side base area, normally marked with yellow discs on the hill. It can be used to get all the way to Upper Bowl during times when the resort is not operating....

The East Catchline is sometimes maintained and will take you back to the area where Mt. Bachelor is planning a new lift. In order to get back to lift access and the base area an uphill walk of about 20 minutes is required at the end of the catchline....

Alpine Trail makes the most direct route from Government Camp to Timberline Lodge on skis, beginning at Summit Pass Ski Area. As mapped here in the uphill direction, it makes a relaxed tour through the woods on Mount Hood, climbing nearly 2000 feet on a gradual incline....

This is a designated uphill route within Timberline Resort, open for skinning at any time. It’s also the beginning of the southside routes to climb Mount Hood, and the approach to backcountry skiing zones like Illumination Rock and Zigzag Glacier....

The black diamond-rated Ariel Chairline is hands-down the best Hollywood line on Mt. Ashland, with some of the best hits on the main mountain found on a small cliff band right next to the chairlift....

Brutus is arguably one of the two best glades on Mt. Ashland. Easily accessible from the Windsor lift, this glade of towering douglas firs holds great snow through even the best of powder days....

This is one of the typical ski descents on Mount Hood. It's reached by walking west from the summit and across a short section of moderate knife edge. The entrance is obvious as a narrow, somewhat sheltered chute that tends to hold good snow....