Arizona Snowbowl

Skiing began here in 1938, when the U.S. Forest Service permitted a road and lodge on the western slopes of the San Francisco Peaks. The resort sits at 9,200 feet at the base and climbs to 11,500 at the top, a 2,300-foot vertical drop — the largest in Arizona — across 777 acres. The San Francisco Peaks are sacred to 13 Native American tribes, including the Hopi and Navajo, who have fought the resort's snowmaking in five separate lawsuits. That tension is the real story here, not the powder.