Labor Day empties the beach at Ulery's Lake before it empties the trail around it. The canoes come out of the water first. The golf carts thin out next, as members who split their season between Big Sky and somewhere warmer start making their exit calls. But the loop trail that circles the lake gets busier through September, not quieter, because it is the one piece of ground at Moonlight Basin that was never gated in the first place.
That is the real shape of the six weeks between Labor Day and Big Sky Resort's opening day on November 25, 2026. It is not a lull. It is the one stretch of the calendar when the neighborhood's private trail network functions like public land, and this year, for one dinner in late September, the resort's own headline chef will do something similar: walk off the property and cook in Town Center instead.
If you're in Big Sky, I recommend above all to simply find a creek, river, hillside or meandering trail.
That line comes from chef Eduardo Garcia, one of the guest chefs booked for Big Sky's new fall festival. It is worth sitting with for a moment, because the trail he is talking about is not hypothetical here. Moonlight Basin has one.
The Only Gate That Doesn't Lock
Most of what makes Moonlight Basin a private club is exactly that: private. Moonlight Lodge went members-only in 2017. LakeLodge, which opened in 2021 with fewer than twenty units and its own restaurant and bar, was built as a members' amenity from the start. But the Ulery's Lake Loop Trail, a 3.9-mile natural-surface loop that starts at a trailhead on the west side of the Moonlight Lodge parking lot, is public. It is the only private club in the area that allows public access to trails on its own land, and that fact adds real mileage to the connected trail system the rest of Big Sky uses.
The route itself tells you where you are. You cross an 800-foot skier bridge almost immediately, then a second bridge, then two dirt roads that cut through Moonlight Basin residences before the trail drops to the lakeshore. From there you can see the private amenities you are not signing up for on this particular walk: a dock, a warming yurt, an elaborate tree fort built for members' kids. You keep walking. The trail climbs back through forest and across a handful of ski runs, passes a bench with a clean view of Wilson Peak, and finishes back at the trailhead, where interpretive signs along the way cover local wildlife, geology, and wetlands. If you want a drink or a snack when you're done, the Tavern sits right there in Moonlight Lodge.
Two things are worth knowing before you go. Portions of the trail sometimes close for construction, because Moonlight Basin's build-out on the west side of the property, including the Iron Drive Cabins and homesites at White Wolf Knob, is still active enough that a county staff report from January 2026 noted water and wastewater infrastructure under construction in the area. And this is bear country. Sightings along Ulery's Lake Loop are common enough that hiking with some noise and awareness is standard practice, not paranoia.
What Closes When the Snow Doesn't Come Yet
Not every trail at Moonlight Basin runs on the same clock. Some are built to disappear the moment the lifts start turning, because the same ground that carries a mountain bike in August carries a ski edge in January. Others are graded to work in both directions, snowshoe and hiking boot both welcome.
That split matters more in September and October than at any other point in the year, because it is when the summer-only terrain starts shutting down while the resort itself is still weeks from opening.
| Trail | Distance | Season |
|---|---|---|
| Ulery's Lake Loop | 3.9 miles (plus a shorter 0.6-mile loop from LakeLodge) | Year-round, hike and bike in summer, snowshoe in winter |
| Lodge Loop | 2.9 miles | Year-round, connects Moonlight Lodge and LakeLodge |
| YP's Way | About 1.25 miles | Year-round, old-growth forest |
| Elk Knob | 3 miles | Summer only, views of Lone Peak, Cedar, and Fan Mountains |
| Elkhorn Trail | 2.2 miles out-and-back | Summer only, climbs near the top of the 6-Shooter lift |
| Madison Loop | 3.9 miles | Summer only, starts and ends at Madison Village |
Elk Knob, Elkhorn, and Madison Loop are the ones that quietly go dark first. They are not closed by a gate or a sign, they are closed by the calendar itself, because the terrain they occupy is about to become ski runs again. The trails that stay open through the shoulder season, Ulery's Lake Loop, Lodge Loop, and YP's Way, are the connective tissue that keeps Moonlight Basin walkable while the rest of the mountain waits for snow.
Madison Lodge, at the Madison Base Area, stays open to all guests through this stretch too, with its ski school, restaurant, rental shop, and gift store already gearing up for the season ahead. It is the one lodge on the property that never went private, which puts it in the same category as the trail: built for members, but never restricted to them.
The Chef Leaves the Mountain
The same loosening shows up somewhere you would not expect this year: in the kitchen at One&Only Moonlight Basin.
The resort opened in 2025 as the first One&Only property in the United States, with three restaurants on site, chauffeured ATV rides to guest rooms, and a newly built observation deck. One of those three restaurants is Akira Back, the namesake spot from the Michelin-starred chef of the same name. For most of the year, that kitchen cooks for people who are already on the mountain.
On September 25, 2026, it won't. Akira Back is joining Ming Tsai, the host chef of Big Sky's BāBā at Yellowstone Club, for a joint dinner as part of the inaugural Big Sky Food and Wine Festival, a two-day event running September 25 and 26 at the Big Sky Events Arena in Town Center, with additional dinners beginning the evening before. Tsai previewed the collaboration this way:
It's going to be eight courses. Some Dom Pérignon and Krug will be poured. Gonna be really fun.
The festival itself is new. It was founded by JD Hock, a former tech executive and co-founder of Bozeman's Alpenglow Music Festival, who says the idea came together fast enough that he sent out a short list of restaurant invitations on a Sunday and had fifteen responses by Monday morning. What he built from that is not small: nearly fifty Michelin-star restaurants and twenty-five award-winning winemakers, with guest chefs including Nancy Silverton, Jeremy Ford, Marc Forgione, and Eduardo Garcia alongside Tsai and Akira Back. Saturday night closes with a pizza party from Silverton and Forgione at Tips Up, an omakase dinner from chef Wei Chen at Backcast inside Montage Big Sky, and a Chef's After Party at Buck's Roadhouse that benefits the Big Sky Community Food Bank.
For a Moonlight Basin resident, the detail that actually matters is smaller than the festival's scale. It is that the neighborhood's own restaurant, the one usually reserved for whoever is staying on property, is spending one night in September doing the opposite: showing up in Town Center, cooking alongside a chef from across the valley, for anyone who bought a ticket.
The Six Weeks, Mapped
Strip away the festival and the trail statistics, and the shoulder season at Moonlight Basin still has a rhythm to it. It looks something like this:
- Early September: the lake empties out faster than the trail does, and Ulery's Lake Loop starts seeing more foot traffic than it did at the height of summer
- Mid-September: golf carts thin out as members who split time between Big Sky and elsewhere begin their seasonal exits
- Late September: the Food and Wine Festival pulls the neighborhood's own chef into Town Center for one weekend, then everyone comes back
- October: Elk Knob, Elkhorn, and Madison Loop quietly close for the season as the terrain waits to become ski runs again
- Mid-November: gear starts appearing at the Madison Lodge rental shop ahead of the season
- November 25, 2026: Big Sky Resort opens for the winter, running daily through April 11, 2027, with bonus weekend access into late April
None of that is a gap in the calendar. It is the one window when a private mountain community loosens its own rules, on the trail and in the kitchen, before it tightens back up for ski season.
If you already call Moonlight Basin home and want a closer read on how the neighborhood's ownership structure, membership categories, or new construction phases affect what you can access and when, Helms, Bauchman, O'Reilly, and Associates has spent decades tracking exactly that kind of detail here. Contact us.
