Versatility.

MITZI BESTALL DIGS HER WORK -- SOMETIMES WITH A SNOW SHOVEL

Mitzi Bestall has a sofa sleeper in her office just in case she gets snowed in -- and she wouldn't object to an overnight stay.

That would mean snow, powder, freshies at one of North America's few all-powder ski areas. With a base at 10,610 feet and summit at 12,240 feet, Berthoud Pass Ski Area sits atop the Continental Divide and averages 500-plus inches of snow a year.

As general manager of Berthoud Pass Ski Area, Bestall has been known to do everything from shovel snow to learn avalanche safety at Colorado's oldest ski area, founded in 1937.

"I've learned how to read the snow and the crystals and what causes the avalanches," said Bestall, gazing at the mountains from her lodge office window. "I never thought I'd find myself in such a position, but it was the right place at the right time -- a great job."

Life in the mountains is quite a contrast to Bestall's days as a lifelong "desert rat" growing up in Arizona. She worked in client relations and event planning for the Fortune 500 MicroAge Inc. in Tempe, Ariz., before moving to Colorado three ski seasons ago to work in administration at Berthoud's sister resort, Silver Creek Golf & Ski Ranch.

"This is the most scenic place," said Bestall, 40, who became Berthoud Pass general manager last April, one of only four female general managers of a ski area in the nation. "The windows of this old lodge sometimes rattle and sometimes snow blows through."

Legend has it that two skiers who died in an avalanche on Berthoud Pass' opening day, Feb. 7, 1937, still haunt the lodge. Staffers who have slept in the bunkroom overnight during heavy snows insist they have heard the ghosts clattering in the night.

Despite its heavy snows and reputation as a high-country paradise, nature isn't always kind to Berthoud Pass. Early this ski season a snow drought delayed opening. And even after the ski area opened in mid-December, much of its 1,200 acres of skiable terrain remained off limits for lack of snow.

"It can be very hard to be up here in mid-December waiting for Mother Nature to dump...