Colorado, better late then never

jaa37's comments illlustrate why Mammoth and Bachelor are fighting an uphill battle in attracting destination visitors from beyond the West Coast. I note his trip is April 2-6, not a full week. Not only for price but nonstop flights I agree SLC or Denver makes more sense. The shorter distances to ski areas from SLC argue in favor of there over Denver for a short trip. Also everything in Utah is still open April 2-6 though the best skiing should nearly always be in LCC.

With regard to spring conditions, you've probably read the Alta/Snowbird debate. Beaver Creek is comparable in snow preservation. Vail has a lot more sun exposed terrain in the back bowls. On a typical sunny spring day that is not much of a problem because the exposures can be timed and the north-facing on the front and Blue Sky are still a lot of terrain.

I should add that in my generalization about late season being best in Colorado there are exceptions. I think January is best at both Vail and Steamboat.

With regard to mikesathome, his trip is both later and longer. If they go to Utah his snowboarder son is restricted to Snowbird only. Unless they are both experts they will likely prefer the greater variety of areas still open in Colorado. But the case for Mammoth or Bachelor is even more compelling, and on a full week trip factoring in lodging I think the cost will be close.
 
Have the direct flights from LAX helped Mammoth's destination traffic? I remember people complaining about the inconvenient departure/arrival times (for those hoping to maximize skiing) a while back.
 
The complaints last year were about the one flight a day from LAX. The return flight left in early afternoon (cutting back ski time) in order to be in LAX in time to make potential connecting flights.

This year a second LAX flight (with better hours) has been added plus two more from Reno and San Jose. The airline is Horizon, which is affiliated with Alaska. Connections to the PNW should be quite good, not so sure about to the East and Midwest. Mammoth is perhaps more on the Northwest skiers' radar, plus there is a mild tendency for Mammoth to have good years when theirs are not.

SoCal proportion of Mammoth skier vists was historically 95%. I heard that it had dipped to 85% but was back up to 90% a couple of years ago.

I think the flight connections to Redmond are still better than Mammoth's, plus Bend lodging is clearly cheaper.
 
Looks good!!

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mikesathome":ng3g4so2 said:
Looks good!!
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Yeah, but you'll need this over and over again since you're dates are still quite a ways off (though it'll help base depth along the divide/summit co areas). Although also true that these are the kind of spring storms that give Colo a decent uptick in mar/apr snowfall relative to most areas. Hopefully a 'pattern' that will stick around till early May.

While I'll finally be back on-hill this weekend it'll be standing around as the Start Ref for the YSL Championship at Eldora (basically the champs race of the Devo circuit in Colo. And hey, at least I'm not the Chief of Race this year). But hoping to get one day every other weekend for another month+ so I can go over the 15 ski day mark.
 
Hey mikesathome and FirstTracksOnline for that matter,

This is my first post and to be perfectly honest I work for Vail (just so we're laying all of our cards out on the table)
I couldn't help but give my own two cents here and help out.

Mikesathome,
That's great you got a free place to stay. It's pretty busy up here that time of year but there's a lot of fun going on too! Since you might be staying in Breck, you got the Spring Massive http://www.breckenridge.com/events/spri ... d=SOC00011 & just over the pass at Vail is Spring Back to Vail April 12-18 http://www.vail.com/events/spring-back- ... d=SOC00011

Parking costs $25 which is kinda steep but if you're willing to hop on a bus, here are some free parking spots not many people know about: http://www.vail.com/insiders-guide/park ... d=SOC00011

Lastly, rfarren is right & the Bowls get a little toasty facing the South in the afternoon. My favorite area to ski is the Champagne Glade in Earl's Bowl. You can lap that area really fast & with a side country access, it's a blast to ski!

Really enjoy the comments
 
D.F., aka snowdotcom, glad to see you here. Some industry types float through from time to time, and when their comments are honest and forthright their contributions are welcomed by our readers. Hope that you'll do so often.
 
Admin":21ib609h said:
D.F., aka snowdotcom, glad to see you here. Some industry types float through from time to time, and when their comments are honest and forthright their contributions are welcomed by our readers. Hope that you'll do so often.
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Come to think of it, you know what other resort is a great option in that timeframe? Taos.
 
Come to think of it, you know what other resort is a great option in that timeframe? Taos.
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It would be (in terms of snow preservation) if it were open. Telluride too. But both close first weekend of April, often with the best conditions of the season.
 
Tony Crocker":3ojdbzns said:
Come to think of it, you know what other resort is a great option in that timeframe? Taos.
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It would be (in terms of snow preservation) if it were open. Telluride too. But both close first weekend of April, often with the best conditions of the season.
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Sorry, joke.
 
Okay -- we're headed to Vail April 2-5. So excited! We arrive on Friday night and were thinking of staying overnight in Denver to acclimate to the altitude (last time out there I ended up getting a little bit sick). The only concern we had is that we'll be socked with traffic on Saturday morning. Are we better off just driving out on Friday night around 10 p.m.? Thanks again for all the advice...
 
Vail is is 8,000 feet, and most people can sleep fine at that altitude right away. The convenience factor of being up there for Saturday morning should be worth it unless you know from prior experience that someone in your group is super sensitive to altitude. With the 9,000+ resorts the odds of altitude difficulties increase. Perhaps 1/4 of flatlanders would benefit noticeably from the overnight in Denver first.
 
jaa37":e01mm0fl said:
The only concern we had is that we'll be socked with traffic on Saturday morning. Are we better off just driving out on Friday night around 10 p.m.?
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What Tony said for the altitude part. Breck & Copper for example approach 10K feet at the base vs Vail's 8200' base.

As for traffic, still a possibility for significant traffic that weekend (esp if new snow has fallen). You'd want to leave Denver by 6:30am (or wait past 10am). Vail should be just over 2 hrs from DIA on good roads (also add 20 min for baggage and 15-20min for rental pick up)...
 
mikesathome":20bjrhsy said:
Looks good!!

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Funny thing about this thread, you can always get the current weather picture LOL!

We are flying in the 15th to spend a night in Denver with a old friend, then off to the MT's
Weather pattern is still doing pretty darn good \:D/
 
I was ragging on this region pretty hard during their crappy first half of the season. But no question this is where the most snow has been falling in the past 2 weeks or so.
 
The latest from sunny Colorado:

Super warm - 10-20 deg above normal - yesterday through Wed... Temps at the base of most resorts in the upper 40's to mid 50's for 3-4 days... followed by a storm thurs/fri bringing temps down to perhaps below normal for a couple of days before warming back up to only a bit above normal sun/mon next week... At least that is the current outlook... If you want to believe websites that give longer term forecasts they seem to indicate active snowfall will become fairly frequent again after that with close to normal temps for this time of year...

I actually have to take a vaca day again Wed (I'm bumping up against my max allowed on the books at work), so will file just an Eldora report on current conditions there - that would be 9.2 to 10.8K altitude.
 
EMSC":2a07w89e said:
The latest from sunny Colorado:

Super warm - 10-20 deg above normal - yesterday through Wed... Temps at the base of most resorts in the upper 40's to mid 50's for 3-4 days... followed by a storm thurs/fri bringing temps down to perhaps below normal for a couple of days before warming back up to only a bit above normal sun/mon next week... At least that is the current outlook... If you want to believe websites that give longer term forecasts they seem to indicate active snowfall will become fairly frequent again after that with close to normal temps for this time of year...

I actually have to take a vaca day again Wed (I'm bumping up against my max allowed on the books at work), so will file just an Eldora report on current conditions there - that would be 9.2 to 10.8K altitude.
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Ouch, ya I did see the temps getting up there, but at this point flights are booked and so are the rooms.
So yes, I want to believe website that give long range forecast like that LOL
 
It does look like the next couple of days could be huge. It's going to quickly warm up again by Sunday, but Thurs and Friday look to be a solid return to winter.
 
While I was out there (11 days) Vail got hit hard. They 10 inches from the first storm, 5 from the second although I think Blue Sky got more, and 14 from the last. They've been getting hit hard. It skied really well while I was there, much better than Utah for that matter, but that is like saying the left lane was moving faster for 30 seconds in a traffic jam.
 
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