I rise before the sun at Tamarack Resort, a ritzy ski area in central Idaho’s Payatte River Mountains. My body must still be on East Coast time. It’s dry here. My partner, Isabel, and I are visiting from New York and, admittedly, our timing for this trip could have been better. We flew west with dreams of soft turns in Idaho’s iconic powder but managed to miss a few weeks’ worth of storms by only a couple of days. Just prior to our arrival, ski areas across the Gem State were consistently covered with fresh snow all month long. Now, in the final week of February, we find ourselves smack dab in the middle of a brief melt-freeze pattern and the next set of refills scheduled to arrive soon after we depart. C’est la vie.

Oh well. Things could definitely be worse. Isabel shrugs off the small stuff as she lounges slopeside at Tamarack Resort.

Fortunately, it’s proving difficult for us to have a bad time on this trip. Facing suboptimal conditions, optimism prevails. We’re here to eat too many potatoes and unabashedly answer the call of a new, shared experience. At this very moment, we’re all out of taters. That’s why today we’re setting our sights on scoring the Central Idaho Hat Trick.

If you’re unfamiliar with the Central Idaho Hat Trick, that’s because we just made that term up. The challenge involves skiing from the highest inbounds point of three Central Idaho ski areas in a single day’s time. We’ll kick things off with early ups at Tamarack Resort before driving 30 miles north to the independently owned and operated Brundage Mountain Resort. From Brundage, we’ll double-back and stop at Little Ski Hill, a cozy, community focused operation with a not-so-whopping 405-vertical-feet of terrain serviced by an old T-bar teeming with tweens, teens and other dedicated locals in between. It’s almost 8 a.m., so I’d better get going.

Corduroy for breakfast, the next best thing to powder. We lucked out with cloudless skies and beautifully kept groomers at Tamarack.

Although, I’m having a hard time wanting to leave this hotel room. We’re staying in a fully decked out slopeside condo complete with a kitchen fit for Betty Crocker herself, bathroom with heated tiles and jetted tub, and living room with roaring fireplace and unobstructed views of the resort’s trails. My eyes wander from the terrain park up towards the top of the mountain. I imagine a top-to-bottom run combining tree skiing, fast groomers and some freestyle fun, then getting on the lift to do it all over again. Something-for-everyone seems to be the vibe here, whether you’re the type who spends their time at the ski area skiing all day or not. Our accommodations are just one part of Tamarack’s resort village, a walkable area that offers visitors a variety of places to shop and eat out.

Scoping lines at the top of Tamarack Resort. Some of the best terrain at the ski area is found off this ridge, namely Grouse Bowl, according to longtime local and recently appointed Director of Marketing Beth Bowman.

We link with Tamarack Resort’s Director of Marketing, Beth Bowman, at the Tamarack Express. The high-speed quad whisks us up 1,700 vertical feet as we bask in the morning light with roughly 360 degrees of stunning views of the Payette River and Tamarack’s surrounding mountains.

Scenic might be an understatement to describe these valley views.

We exit the Tamarack Express and hop on the Summit Express which will bring us to the 7,700-foot summit of Tamarack Resort. On the lift, Beth points lookers left. She tells us that the best terrain for more advanced freeskiers is accessed by traversing from the summit, down the ridgeline and into Grouse Bowl. She explains that, so long as temps stay below freezing, her and her friends often find fresh lines to ski even multiple days after the area’s most recent snowstorms—untouched lines that, if navigated correctly, lead right back into the ski area. Isabel and I would love to explore all that Tamarack’s 1,100-plus acreage has to offer, but we have just enough time for one run. We do our best to soak up Tamarack’s postcard-worthy ambience, then we pack the van and vamoose. Next stop: Brundage.

Despite no fresh snowfall in several days, we luck out and find a few windblown zones to wiggle around in towards the bottom of our one run at Tamarack.

Compared to Tamarack, Brundage is more bare bones. You won’t find an upscale village and hotel rooms here. Instead, you’ll be met with two relatively modest ski lodges. One is home to a lift ticket counter, gear rental, ski patrol and a souvenir shop. The other holds a bustling pub, Smoky’s Bar and Grill, and a whole lot of friendly locals. Brundage is the kind of place where you’ve got pretty much everything you need to ski, and not much of what you don’t.

The base area at Brundage Resort.

The main attraction at Brundage is the skiing itself. Poke around the mountain and it’s easy to see endless freeskiing opportunities—rock poppers, cliff drops, places to get tight and technical, zones to let loose and go fast, and so much more. It’s even bigger than Tamarack, boasting an alluring 1,920 acres of lift-accessed terrain, including 420 acres of lift-accessed, un-patrolled (no avalanche mitigation) backcountry terrain. Given the current low-tide conditions, we make our way to the resort’s two terrain parks. Situated adjacent to each other, there’s a nice and easy setup for beginners and another for more advanced skiers.  The latter starts with a garden of finely constructed jibs before leading into a snappy cannon-rail and two-jump line that flows like a slopestyle run. I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the lofty hip with its smooth landing, too.

The combination of a cloudless sky and warm air lends way for our hardpacked, icy morning to transform into a springy, slushy afternoon. I work on a few tricks and Isabel successfully slides her first flat box. Temps may be high, but so too are our spirits. By midday, some of the wide-open, off-piste terrain situated between Brundage’s plentiful groomers become sunbaked and skiable. We make haste to cut into it.

Fast, hard groomers give way to a slushy, softer afternoon. The perfect time to put away the camera and go slide some metal in the park at Brundage.

Again, we’d love to stay. But we’ve got to run. Brundage’s lifts stop spinning at 4 p.m., just as Little Ski Hill’s T-bar starts. Only six miles from Brundage, we pull into Little Ski Hill’s diminutive parking lot and walk into a lodge that makes Brundage’s look like Tamarack’s in comparison. Here at Little Ski Hill, lift tickets are sold at the snack bar concession stand and cost only $25 for the day. By the time we get to the T-Bar it’s packed with dozens of kids here for their after-school program. Soulful hardly begins to describe it.

The basic yet sufficient lift tickets at Little Ski Hill are emblematic of the homey, non-profit operation itself. As an added bonus to that vibe, you purchase them at the lodge’s snack bar concession stand for only $25.

Much to our surprise, the terrain park here is popping. I didn’t expect to see a single metal feature in the snow, yet there’s a full top-to-bottom park with several jibs and a few small kickers to boot. On top of that, there’s a smaller hike park near the lodge comprised of a few boxes, bonks and one of the nicest flat bars I’ve had the pleasure of sliding all season.

This final stop on our whirlwind of a day is an embodiment of the same spirit that’s fueling our entire adventure through the Gem State. It’s the same energy that inspired the Central Idaho Hat Trick; a testament to the notion that we create our own luck. Because even when the weather is stacked against you, with the right attitude, you can always score.

And when all else fails, there’ll always be more potatoes.

Isabel exhibits her best impression of Zoolander’s “Blue Steel” in front of the lodge at Little Ski Hill, all smiles after successfully scoring the Central Idaho Hat Trick.

Thank you to Tony Harrison and Ski Idaho for facilitating this incredible adventure. Thank you also to the fine folks at Tamarack Resort, Brundage Mountain Resort and Payette Lakes Ski Club’s Little Ski Hill for having us out for a rip. Despite the low tide conditions, every stop of the tour was a blast. Consider the zones scoped and us ready to return when the snow starts falling again.