YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK — The low snow early winter is continuing right through the busy holiday season at Yellowstone National Park. While a snowy forecast for the next five days may help, a lack of snow means only snow coaches are allowed on interior park roads right now. Many are making that trip every day, but the park remains off limits for snowmobiles.
Yellowstone National Park Superintendent Cam Sholly said, “The issue until we get a snowpack will be obviously for the snowmobiles and the tracked snow coaches. But you know, we're in communication with them [guides and businesses] regularly.”
Despite challenging snow conditions, Yellowstone's winter tourism industry adapts and continues serving visitors
“So we have great coverage in the park, but there are some fair spots that have appeared in the last few days as the warming of the temperatures. But we see cooling temperatures coming. We're keeping our fingers crossed and hoping for the best in the next few days,” said Yellowstone Guide Amy Beegel.
But what’s really needed now is snow. Sunday saw heavy snow falling in West Yellowstone. That’s just what winter sports enthusiasts need. About 4 to 6 inches of snow accumulated on the ground since the park opened on the 15th of December, but with warm spells and even some rain, it’s not enough to build up the snow pack on the roads that snowmobiles travel.
“The weather seems to be a little weird this year. But you know, we're all geared up and ready for it. So it's not anything unusual to us, you know, winters or they can, they're gonna be what they're gonna be, right? We can't control the weather,” said Katrina Wiese, the President & CEO of the West Yellowstone Chamber of Commerce.
As that heavy snow tumbled out of the sky in West Yellowstone late Sunday morning, Beegel was at Old Faithful, where even heavier snow was falling. She shared a video showing big flakes blurring the landscape as skiers crossed in front of the visitor center sign.
“Look at this beautiful stuff,” said Beegel on the video.
Video from December 15th showed bare pavement at the West Entrance to the park and little snow on the ground. By Sunday, that had changed to a thin snow pack, but still not enough. Even so, tourism business operators said they are not getting a lot of cancellations.
“Unfortunately, we've been through this before. It's a little crazy calling everybody at the last minute. But it's great that the park does allow us to go ahead and go in, even though they may restrict the snowmobiles,” said Travis Watt, the Manager of Three Bear Lodge in West Yellowstone.
Yellowstone National Park public relations officials told MTN News that the southern parts of the park are seeing a bit more snow, but how it all adds up this week remains to be seen. Meantime, snowmobiling is still possible in the Lionhead near West Yellowstone, and some other areas outside the park.
