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Alyeska

Home / Ski Resorts / Alyeska Ski Resort

Alyeska Ski Resort is a ski area located in the state of Alaska in USA. The resort is in the town of Girdwood, AK.

We recently ranked all of Alaska's ski resorts, so you can see where Alyeska stacks up against all its nearby ski hills!

Season Passes

Alyeska is a part of the Ikon Ski Pass network. This allows you to buy one lift pass, and ski at all or most of the Ikon-sponsored slopes with it throughout the year, depending on the type of pass you bought.

Lodging Options

There are numerous options to stay at Alyeska around the resort. Check out the available options with the form below.

Alyeska Mountain Resort Terrain Overview

Alyeska has a total of 76 ski trails, which are serviced by 7 ski lifts, gondolas and/or trams. The amount of skiable area in this park is huge, with a maximum of 1,610 acres available to skiers. This area is equivalent to 652 hectares, 2.5 square miles, or 6.5 square kilometers.

Alyeska's slopes see on average 650 inches (16.5 meters) of snowfall a year. That is almost 54 feet every year!

Trails
Total Runs
76
Ski Lift
Lifts
7
Skier
Skiable Acres
1,610(7 km2)
Snow
Annual Snowfall
650"(1,651 cm)

Alyeska Ski Resort Elevation

Alyeska Ski Resort has a summit elevation of 3,939 feet, or 1,201 meters. However, not all of that elevation is able to be skied. The base of the ski slope sits at 250 feet above sea level, creating a ski hill that is 3,689 feet (1,124 meters) high. This is referred to as the slope's vertical drop - or a measure of how high the skiable hill is.

Alyeska's summit elevation is about average. There are a lot of ski slopes that are quite a bit higher, but also many that are much, much smaller.

Mountain Summit
Summit Elevation
3,939'(1,201 m)
Vertical Drop
Vertical Drop
3,689'(1,124 m)
Mountain base
Base Elevation
250'(76 m)

Alyeska Ski Resort Difficulty Level

Score
Difficulty Score™
77out of 100
←  EasyHard  →
Alyeska is one of the hardest ski areas in the country, with a difficulty score of 77. This mountain ranks in the top 10% of most-difficult ski resorts in all of North America, mostly due to the fact that it has 37% of its trails rated as expert-level, and a vertical drop of 3,689 feet.
 DID YOU KNOW?

At Parks & Trips, we've created a proprietary Difficulty Score that attempts to show how difficult a particular ski slope is. We get to this number by combining a number of metrics for each resort and comparing them to its peers. Most of the score is based off the amount of easy-intermediate-expert slopes by acreage and the maximum vertical drop of the overall resort, but also includes a few lesser-used metrics as well.

Our algorithm compares each resort’s metrics with all others in North America, then assigns each a Difficulty Score, which we use to rank them accordingly. Resorts with a lower score are easier to ski than those with a higher one. However, a high score does not mean that the resort does not have any easy slopes, or vice versa. This is just an overall score given to the resort based on all its metrics grouped together.

Skiable Terrain by Difficulty Level

Alyeska has 1,610 total skiable acres, which can be broken down into the three main groups of difficulty: Beginner, Intermediate, and Expert.

Seeing as Alyeska is one of the hardest ski areas in the country, it's no surprise that over 89% of its trails rated as either intermediate or expert-level. This leaves only 11% of its skiable acres as beginner terrain.
Green Circle
Beginner
11%(177 acres)

Beginner trails (identified by a green circle) are the easiest trails on the hill with a gradual 25% or less gradient, and are usually wide to accommodate beginner skiers.

Blue Square
Intermediate
52%(837 acres)

Intermediate trails (identified by a blue square) are usually the most popular and crowded runs, which have a slope of anywhere between 25-40%.

Black Diamond
Expert
37%(596 acres)

Expert trails (identified by a black diamond... or two) are the hardest slopes on the mountain, and have very steep gradients over 40%.

Is Alyeska Ski Resort good for beginners?

This is one of the hardest ski areas in the country to ski at, so it is not great for beginners. Alyeska Ski Resort ranks in the top 10% of the most-difficult ski resorts in the country. It has 37% of its trails rated as expert, or black-diamond level.

Alyeska Ski Resort Location

Alyeska Ski Resort is located in the state of Alaska, USA. This ski area is nearest the town of Girdwood, AK.

Address:
Girdwood, AK 99587 USA
View on Google Maps

Website:
alyeskaresort.com

GPS Coordinates:
60.97000, -149.11000

Getting to Alyeska Mountain Resort

By Car: If you are driving, you would set your GPS to either the ski resort's name (Alyeska Ski Resort), its coordinates of 60.97000, -149.11000 (latitude, longitude), or simply drive towards the town of Girdwood, AK to get close.

By Air: If you are coming in from across the country, then you may need to board an airplane to get here.

A large airport has scheduled major airline service with millions of passengers per year. This type of airport always accepts international flights. Here are the closest large airport(s) to Alyeska Ski Resort.

NameCodeCityDistance
Ted Stevens Anchorage International AirportANCAnchorage, AK33 mi

A medium-sized airport has scheduled regional airline service. This type of airport may or may not accept international flights. Here are the closest medium-sized airport(s) to Alyeska.

NameCodeCityDistance
Merle K (Mudhole) Smith AirportCDVCordova, AK127 mi

There may also be much smaller regional airports next to Alyeska Ski Resort, but we didn't list them here due to the fact that no major airlines go through them.

Other Nearby Ski Resorts

Skiers will - especially if coming from far away - try and visit a couple different slopes all in the same trip. Here are the closest other ski slopes within 100 miles of Alyeska Ski Resort.

NameLocationSummitDifficulty Score™Distance
Arctic ValleyEagle River, AK3,900 ft48%25 mi
Hilltop Ski AreaAnchorage, AK894 ft12%34 mi

Alyeska Ski Resort Mountain Stats

NameStatistic
Summit Elevation3,939 ft
Base Elevation250 ft
Vertical Drop3,689 ft
Trails76
(11% Beginner,  52% Intermediate,  37% Expert)
Lifts7
Skiable Acres1,610
Avg. Annual Snowfall650 inches
Alyeska Ski Resort Mountain Stats
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