Best Places to Snowshoe In Wyoming
Posted by Crescent Moon on Nov 11th 2020
Wyoming’s wide-open spaces encompass a superabundance of world-class mountain ranges, some of the nation’s largest and most varied populations of big mammals, and—not least because of an average elevation well over 6,000 feet—lots and lots of powdery snow.
With a pair of Crescent Moon snowshoes—such as our Eva or Luna foam snowshoes—cradling your feet, you’ve got the full range of winter adventures at your disposal in the Cowboy State: from established trails close to town to some of the deepest mountain wilderness in the U.S. Here are some of the very best snowshoeing spots in this vast, high, and wildlife-packed state!
Bighorn National Forest Snowshoe Trails
The evocative Bighorn Mountains loom out of open steppe lands as an isolated easterly outlier of the Rockies. Their plentiful snows and the Bighorn National Forest’s ample public lands make the Bighorns one of those best-kept-secret kinds of snowshoeing destinations. Sample their scenery on the trails of the Pole Creek and Willow Creek Nordic areas, or roam unplowed forest roads and trackless backcountry drifts in the vicinity of Powder River Pass. Snowshoeing Powder River Pass will give you a lofty mountain playground south of the Cloud Peak Wilderness and its namesake summit, the 13,189-foot high point of the Bighorns.
Tie City/Happy Jack Trail System
Just minutes from the city of Laramie, the Tie City and Happy Jack trailheads provide snowshoers as well as cross-country skiers with extensive circuits in the weathered heights of the Laramie Mountains in the Medicine Bow National Forest. Multiuse trails here include the Haunted Forest, Aspen, Summit, Crow Creek loops—and the Snowshoe Trail itself.
Snowshoe Grand Teton National Park
The gigantic east face of the Teton Range, rearing from Snake River lowlands to 13,000-plus-foot peaks, is one of the most celebrated mountain fronts on the continent, and it’s an all-out privilege to admire these soaring horns and jags in their imposing wintry coats. You’ve got endless snowshoeing opportunities in Grand Teton National Park, with major access provided by the unplowed Teton Park, Moose-Wilson, and Signal Mountain Summit roads. Don’t miss the winter-mode vistas from the Phelps Lake and Jenny Lake trails—and keep your eyes peeled for moose!
The park also offers ranger-led snowshoe hikes out of the Taggart Lake Trailhead: an excellent opportunity to combine your work-up-a-sweat tromp with some interpretive ecology.
Yellowstone National Park
It’s not an exaggeration to say that Yellowstone National Park offers some of the most incredible snowshoeing opportunities anywhere on the planet. After all, the vast Yellowstone Plateau and the somewhat lower Northern Range that compose this oldest’s national park in the world pile up impressive snowfalls, and they come roamed by a spectacular roster of easily seen wildlife: from river otters, badgers, coyotes, and bald eagles to gray wolves, elk, moose, bighorn sheep, pronghorn, and bison. (Yellowstone’s famous bears—grizzlies and black bears—tend to be snoozing most of the winter, but remain bear-aware at all times: Male bears, in particular, may den late and emerge early, and some grizzlies make occasional mid-winter rounds to scavenge plentiful carcasses.) Add in one of the globe’s most spectacular concentration of geothermal features, and you’ve got an incomparable place to give those foam snowshoes a go.
Unplowed roads and trails in Yellowstone—including the numerous designated ski routes—are open to snowshoeing, and experienced recreationists can strike off into the legitimately enormous backcountry (steering clear of wildlife and potentially hazardous geothermal zones alike). From pluming geysers and hot springs to the steamy breath of frosty bison—maybe, if your lucky, a glimpse of wolves coursing wintering elk in the Lamar Valley—Yellowstone is pretty much guaranteed to bowl you over.
Wyoming Wandering in Crescent Moon Foam Snowshoes
What’s better than the sight of snow streamers off the tooth of the Grand Teton, watching bison march through heavy Yellowstone drifts in single file, savoring the profound silence in the subalpine forest of the Bighorns? Doing all of the above in a pair of Crescent Moon foam snowshoes, that’s what!