Podcast #89: Mountain High & Dodge Ridge President and CEO Karl Kapuscinski

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Who

Karl Kapuscinski, President and CEO of Mountain High and Dodge Ridge, California

Recorded on

June 6, 2022

About Mountain High

Click here for a mountain stats overview

Owned by: Invision Capital and Karl Kapuscinski

Located in: Wrightwood, California

Closest neighboring ski areas: Mt. Waterman (45 minutes), Mt. Baldy (1 hour, 15 minutes – they’re only 8.4 miles apart as the crow flies, but 57.4 miles apart via road!), Snow Valley (1 hour, 25 minutes), Big Bear/Snow Summit (1 hour 40 minutes)

Base elevation | summit elevation | vertical drop:

West Resort: 7,000 feet | 8,000 feet | 1,000 feet

East Resort: 6,600 feet | 8,200 feet | 1,600 feet

North Resort: 7,200 feet | 7,800 feet | 600 feet

Skiable Acres: 290

Average annual snowfall: 117 inches

Night skiing: West only

Trail count: 60 (35% advanced, 40% intermediate, 25% beginner)

West Resort: 34 (1 expert, 16 advanced, 12 intermediate, 5 beginner)

East Resort: 16 trails (1 expert, 4 advanced, 7 intermediate, 4 beginner)

North Resort: 10 trails (6 intermediate, 4 beginner)

Lift count: 14 (2 high-speed quads, 2 fixed-grip quads, 3 triples, 4 doubles, 3 carpets - view Lift Blog’s inventory of Mountain High’s lift fleet)

West Resort: 1 high-speed quad, 3 triples, 2 doubles, 2 carpets

East Resort: 1 high-speed quad, 1 quad, 2 doubles, 1 carpet

North Resort: 1 quad

About Dodge Ridge

Click here for a mountain stats overview

Owned by: Invision Capital and Karl Kapuscinski

Located in: Pinecrest, California

Closest neighboring ski areas: Bear Valley (2 hours, 6 minutes), June Mountain (2 hours, 24 minutes), Mammoth Mountain (2 hours, 37 minutes), Badger Pass (2 hours, 45 minutes), Kirkwood (2 hours 58 minutes) - travel times may vary in winter due to weather and road closures.

Base elevation: 6,600 feet

Summit elevation: 8,200 feet

Vertical drop: 1,600 feet

Skiable Acres: 862

Average annual snowfall: 300 to 500 inches

Night skiing: No

Trail count: 67 (40% advanced, 40% intermediate, 20% beginner)

Lift count: 12 (1 fixed-grip quad, 2 triples, 5 doubles [2 of these doubles - lifts 1 and 2 below, are making way for one triple chair for the 2022-23 ski season], 1 T-bar, 1 ropetow, 2 conveyors - view Lift Blog’s of inventory Dodge Ridge’s lift fleet)

Why I interviewed him

In the Midwest of my youth, the calculus was simple: north, cold; south, warm. The only weather quirk was lake-effect snow, tumbling off Michigan and Superior in vast snowbelts west and north, and across that mysterious realm known as the UP. Altitude wasn’t a factor because there was no altitude. Iowa, Nebraska, the Dakotas get rounded up by the chortling masses reaching for a flatland target to ridicule, but they overlook Michigan by ignorance, or, if they’re Michiganders, denial and self-preservation. Midland County, where I grew up, is the flattest place I have ever seen, a forever plain that disguises itself in treed horizons.

It was California that alerted me to the notion that altitude could override latitude. It could snow in the south. You just had to get to the sky. The mountains went there. Humans have so overrun modern SoCal that it is easy to forget what an amazing natural monster it is: foreversummer – or at least foreverspring – on the coast. From the beach with bare feet in the sand you can see the mountains*, snow-capped and forbidding, impossible and amazing, thrusting Tolkien-ish over pulsing Los Angeles. Beyond that, ...