Cottonwood Butte
Cottonwood Butte Ski Resort is a ski area located in the state of Idaho in USA. The resort is in the town of Cottonwood, ID.
We recently ranked all of Idaho's ski resorts, so you can see where Cottonwood Butte stacks up against all its nearby ski hills!
Season Passes
Cottonwood Butte is not a part of any nationwide lift ticket system. Passes such as Epic, IKON, or Mountain Collective allow pass holders to ski at multiple mountians with a single purchase. Unfortunately, none of those passes work with Cottonwood Butte Ski Resort. To purchase season passes, you'll need to visit Cottonwood Butte's website.
Lodging Options
There are numerous options to stay at Cottonwood Butte around the resort. Check out the available options with the form below.
Cottonwood Butte Mountain Resort Terrain Overview
Cottonwood Butte has a total of 7 ski trails, which are serviced by 2 ski lifts, gondolas and/or trams. Cottonwood Butte is considered a smaller than average ski area, with only a maximum of 260 acres available to ski. This area is equivalent to 105 hectares, 0.4 square miles, or 1.1 square kilometers.
Cottonwood Butte's slopes see on average 45 inches (1.1 meters) of snowfall a year.
Total Runs
7
Lifts
2
Skiable Acres
260(1 km2)
Annual Snowfall
45"(114 cm)
Cottonwood Butte Ski Resort Elevation
Cottonwood Butte Ski Resort has a summit elevation of 5,565 feet, or 1,696 meters. However, not all of that elevation is able to be skied. The base of the ski slope sits at 4,718 feet above sea level, creating a ski hill that is 846 feet (258 meters) high. This is referred to as the slope's vertical drop - or a measure of how high the skiable hill is.
Cottonwood Butte's summit elevation is higher than average. There are a lot of ski slopes that are much higher than this one (some stretch to 12,000 feet!), but it is not small by any stretch of the imagination.
Summit Elevation
5,565'(1,696 m)
Vertical Drop
846'(258 m)
Base Elevation
4,718'(1,438 m)
Cottonwood Butte Ski Resort Difficulty Level
Difficulty Score™
45.4out of 100
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
Cottonwood Butte has 260 total skiable acres, which can be broken down into the three main groups of difficulty: Beginner, Intermediate, and Expert.
Cottonwood Butte is a beginner-friendly ski area, with about 28% of its trails as easy. However, it also has a fair share of more difficult runs - which account for the remaining 72%.
Beginner
28%(73 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.
Intermediate
29%(75 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%.
Expert
43%(112 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 Cottonwood Butte Ski Resort good for beginners?
Cottonwood Butte can be beginner-friendly, depending on the runs you take. While it ranks in the lower half of all North American ski areas in terms of overall difficulty, it still has 72% of its trails rated at or above intermediate.
Cottonwood Butte Ski Resort Location
Cottonwood Butte Ski Resort is located in the state of Idaho, USA. This ski area is nearest the town of Cottonwood, ID.
Address:
Cottonwood, ID 83522 USA
View on Google Maps
Website:
cottonwoodbutte.org
GPS Coordinates:
46.06000, -116.46000
Getting to Cottonwood Butte Mountain Resort
By Car: If you are driving, you would set your GPS to either the ski resort's name (Cottonwood Butte Ski Resort), its coordinates of 46.06000, -116.46000 (latitude, longitude), or simply drive towards the town of Cottonwood, ID 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 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 Cottonwood Butte.
| Name | Code | City | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lewiston Nez Perce County Airport | LWS | Lewiston, ID | 34 mi |
| Pullman Moscow Regional Airport | PUW | Pullman/Moscow, WA | 56 mi |
| Walla Walla Regional Airport | ALW | Walla Walla, WA | 88 mi |
There may also be much smaller regional airports next to Cottonwood Butte 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 Cottonwood Butte Ski Resort.
| Name | Location | Summit | Difficulty Score™ | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Snowhaven | Grangeville, ID | 5,600 ft | 10% | 22 mi |
| Brundage Mountain | New Meadows, ID | 7,640 ft | 45% | 72 mi |
| Tamarack Resort | Tamarak, ID | 7,700 ft | 65% | 77 mi |
| Little Ski Hill | McCall, ID | 5,700 ft | 29% | 79 mi |
Cottonwood Butte Ski Resort Mountain Stats
| Name | Statistic |
|---|---|
| Summit Elevation | 5,565 ft |
| Base Elevation | 4,718 ft |
| Vertical Drop | 846 ft |
| Trails | 7 (28% Beginner, 29% Intermediate, 43% Expert) |
| Lifts | 2 |
| Skiable Acres | 260 |
| Avg. Annual Snowfall | 45 inches |