Lookout Pass Ski and Recreation Area
Lookout Pass Ski and Recreation Area is a ski area in the western United States. It is at Lookout Pass on Interstate 90, on the border of Idaho and Montana, east of Mullan, Idaho. It has a summit elevation of on Runt Mountain with a vertical drop of on the northeast-facing slopes. Lookout Pass operates seven days per week from the beginning of the ski season until late March then six days a week (closed Tuesday) until closing, which is usually mid-April. The area has tripled in size since 2003; new terrain  was opened to the southeast-facing slopes on the Montana side of the border in December 2003, and on the northwest-facing North Side (in Idaho) in 2006. There are two double chairlifts, one quad chairlift and one triple chairlift at Lookout Pass, whose average annual snowfall exceeds . The elevation of the highway pass on I-90 is a moderate . The historic Mullan Pass, constructed as a wagon road by the U.S. Army in 1860, is about east-northeast as the crow flies, at . Lookout Pass is considered the eastern boundary of Idaho's Silver Valley mining region. Lookout Pass has  two freestyle terrain parks, and a quarter pipe that is . History. Opened in 1935, the Lookout Pass ski area operates under a special-use permit of the U.S. Forest Service, in the Idaho Panhandle National Forests (formerly the "Coeur d'Alene National Forest"). Gradual enhancement of the area has occurred over the decades, and the first chairlift was installed in the summer of 1982. The community ski hill, run by the nonprofit Idaho Ski Club, was sold in 1992 to Lookout Recreation, Inc., a company formed by two 27-year-old former college roommates, Don Walde of Wallace and Jim Fowler . After seven years, it was sold in 1999 to Lookout Associates, headed by Phil Edholm, and plans for expansion soon followed. A new portion of the ski area opened on December 26, 2003, on the Montana side of the border (which is irregular in this area, following mountains, and is actually due south, see topo map). The new Timber Wolf double chair and five new runs increased the vertical drop (by lowering the base to ), and the longest new run in length. Two of the new runs are rated advanced and three are rated intermediate, with views of the St.  Regis and Copper Basins. Additional expansion in 2006 with a chairlift on the Idaho "North Side" opened additional intermediate and expert terrain. In the summer of 2020 the original Chair #1, a 1982 Riblet center-pole double, was replaced by a new Skytrac fixed grip quad. Route of the "Hiawatha" Trail. Lookout Pass is also a primary staging area for the "Route of the Hiawatha Trail", a mountain bike rail trail, which begins in Montana and runs downhill through tunnels and over trestles to the North Fork of the St. Joe River, away. It is named for the "Olympian Hiawatha  passenger trains (1947–61) of the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad (The Milwaukee Road"), on whose abandoned rights of way, trestles, and tunnels the gravel trail rests. Now completed, the Route of the Hiawatha Trail stretches from St. Regis, Montana, to Pearson, Idaho, (elevation ), several miles north of Avery, (equidistantly south of Mullan). The Route of the Hiawatha Trail now includes the tunnel at St. Paul Pass, which is in length at an elevation of . Bus service is available to take bicycle riders back to the start of the trail. A fee is charged for riding the trail, and  during the winter months the trail is closed. Parking and unimproved camping spots are available at the trail's start, as well as at the end of the trail. Several other trails are nearby for further exploration; one of these follows the old road along the North Fork of the St. Joe River to Avery and has an improved campground at its start. Another nearby rail trail is the Trail of the Coeur d'Alenes; from Mullan it travels over westbound, descending the Coeur d'Alene River through Silver Valley and crossing Lake Coeur d'Alene. It follows the former right-of-way  of the Union Pacific Railroad.