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Local Heretic

By Katharine Niles

Fifth grade in Colorado comes with a notable perk: Colorado Ski Country USA gives all desiring fifth graders a FREE ski pass, and it counts all over the state. I was amazed, even though it made perfect, smart, marketing sense. Get a bunch of fifth graders bombing downhill on skis or boards and you've potentially obtained a lifelong business deal. So why, exactly, my amazement? I mean, two less-local-but-still-within-day-trip-reach ski areas - one a huge resort, the other a family-run place under threat of obscene development - also do a pretty good job with regional, family friendly promotions. But my local local mountain (It Who Shall Not Be Named) doesn't fare so well.
Don't get me wrong. I'm fond of it. I ski it a lot. But things got off to a bad start when, years ago, I called to inquire about locals' discounts for the kids' ski school. I was thinking along the lines of Colorado Ski Country USA. I thought: who wouldn't offer local discounts to keep the neighbors loyal throughout their days? Well, these guys don't. No discount, nothing. Then I wondered why they didn't do Locals Days such as the family-run place (OK, it's Wolf Creek), where I have been known to ski and then soak at the hot springs in Pagosa for a grand total of $35. Thirty-five dollars! All for flashing a driver's license with the right address on it! And not only that, but when I taught at Fort Lewis College, I got College Days too. As a result of such gracious marketing, as well as their surprisingly good green chili stew (a truly Southwestern meal) and (best yet) curly fries, my attitude toward Wolf Creek remains one of pleasure and gratitude.
The final straw regarding my local hill, however, occurred this year. Not only did Colorado Ski Country USA's fifth grade offer show up in my son's school bag, but, of all places, the Huge Glitzy Resort, a.k.a. Telluride, came through too. That's right. Telluride came up with a better locals' deal than my dear local mountain. Certainly there are packages for every stripe, and let it be known here that the Niles family is lucky to ski together three or four times a year. I ski the most; Chris boards next; my husband, a persistent grouse about high ticket prices in spite of an annoyingly effortless skiing style achieved on the crusty slopes of New Hampshire, skis least. So when Telluride came up with a $45 Free Day ski pass that entailed a free day plus 25 percent discount on any future mountain endeavor, it sounded perfect. For $45, each adult gets a $92 free pass (pays for itself twice over!), and saves $23 every other time they go. Dang.
That said, it felt vaguely heretical to jump ship. The local mountain equivalent of the Free Day Pass is the Flex Pass, which at $129 gives you the "free" day (a $62 value, so you have to go twice plus some to make it worth it) and then a mere seven bucks off subsequent days. True, 25 percent off Telluride is still $69 for a full day of skiing. But it's Telluride. It's world class. It has gondolas. Saving seven bucks at my local hill, which likes to pretend it's the next Telluride but really should give up on that, seems, well, stingy on its part.
I'd love for my local mountain to be simply at rest with being a slightly bigger Wolf Creek. Then it could stop serving terrible overpriced hamburgers and borrow the green chili stew recipe from the experts over there in Mineral County. It could stop with the obnoxious rock 'n' roll at the bottom of the hill. And most of all (this really gets the locals' dander up) it could stop offering far cheaper ski packages to blithering slope idiots from Phoenix than it does to its own neighbors. In fact, its neighbors wouldn't care if it did just that as long as they felt they were getting a good deal too. But I am not alone in my disgruntlement, and now, sad to say, that my son has a pan-Colorado FREE ski pass to ANYWHERE - why, I just might write my next column from Aspen or Winter Park.
Heresy, I know. It may boot me out of Purgatory but not out of hell, of that I can be sure.

KATHARINE NILES is the author of the award-winning nove The Basket Maker.