Utah is a great school for outdoorsy kids, with the best skiing in the country 30 mins from campus, and amazing climbing, backpacking, etc. with national parks in every direction. My D loves it there (she is double majoring in Environmental Studies) - they do outdoor things almost every weekend and she’s now gone back for the summer to enjoy the outdoors with her friends, they were off climbing again this week and also hiked up a 14000ft peak. Despite the season being cut short she still had 20 days skiing last winter.
There are merit scholarships for high scores, although they also require a high GPA for the top scholarships and so you might not get so much (perhaps up to a $10K-$12K discount for the first year). However, anyone is eligible for instate tuition after the first year if you stay for the summer, which makes it pretty cheap overall (total instate COA is around $25K per year).