Vail & Breckenridge

[danmorgan]

Hi all, I'm thinking about a trip to Vail/Breckenridge this coming season and was wondering what people's thoughts were on a couple of points.

Best time to go?


We'll be going for 10 days to allow time to get over the jetlag (flying from England), and are limited to the following slots: 19th-31st January, 7th-17th February or 6th-18th March. From what I could find on bestsnow.net it looks like the February slot might be the best bet, with March hitting into Spring Break time (too busy and really don't want to have to deal with lots of college students!) and January possibly being a bit early. Is this right?

El Nino effect?
From what I can make out, El Nino shouldn't be affecting Vail/Breckenridge too much but just wanted to check

Car hire?
I'm leaning towards hiring a car for the journey from the airport and to make it easier travelling between resorts, but have read quite a bit about extortionate parking fees etc, is it worth it? Any tips on which rental company is cheaper from DEN?

Best base?

From the research I've done, I think Breckenridge will be a nicer base (not sure I'm keen on the faux-Alpine look of Vail, is it very over the top?) but which one is the best bet for cheap accommodation? We're looking for somewhere cheap, near to the lifts but quiet (I know that's pretty much the Holy Grail but I've got to start somewhere!)

Thanks in advance for the help

Dan

 

[Tony Crocker]

Spring breaks are dispersed over several weeks in the U.S. so no specific week is usually that bad. The February time rates to be the most crowded as it includes President's weekend. January will be the least crowded, March in between. I would pick January for those two resorts, because they have much more sunny exposures than most Colorado areas. They can be cold in January by Euro standards, -15C first thing in the morning sometimes, high temps average -6C. Breckenridge tends to have some wind too, less at Vail/Beaver Creek.

No El Nino effect from historical data.

I'll let the people who ski there more often chime in on lodging specifics, but here's my 2 cents:
When you say budget, forget about walking distance to the lifts, particularly at Vail. You want an outlying area that is on a regular shuttle route to the resorts if you don't want to pay those parking fees. East or West Vail, north of I-70, maybe Avon. I have a very strong preference for Vail over Breckenridge from a ski standpoint: it gets ~30% more snow and the terrain flows a lot better with fewer bottlenecks, more fall line skiing. You also have Beaver Creek next door. But you will spend more at Vail.

 

[EMSC]

I pretty much agree with Tony on most items.

Best time to go?

Jan - can be bitter cold at night and also more potential for wind - especially at Breck. While 95% open, very steepest might not be opened yet (if that's your thing).
Feb - the only issue with your time frame in Feb is that we Americans get either a 3 or 4 day weekend in mid-Feb (President's weekend Feb 12-15, 2010). BIG crowds that weekend nearly everywhere.
March - you could catch some level of early sprin g break folks toward the end of your time frame, but generally US school breaks willl be the couple of weeks later in march to early April. Potentail for some sun affects in places like Vail's Back Bowls.

El Nino effect?

Tony is the statistician. The area's you are looking at no correlation to El Nino; a couple of local TV weather folks claim fewer storms, but bigger storms (hitting total snowfall as basically being average).

Car hire?

Unless you plan to stay in one place the whole time, rental car would be the best bet. You could get To/From and around the area without too horrific of problems and with some waiting around for buses (and walking into town for dinner, etc...) if you prefer; but US is well known for it's car needs/design for flexibility (especially when not going to the handful of explicit 'destination' ski resorts). Parking is typically free at your lodging location, but can cost at the ski areas. Specifically Vail - if you drive to Vail you will end up paying $25/day for parking in one of their garages. Breck, Keystone, Copper have free parking options (with either some light hiking or shuttle busing); A-Basin, Loveland, etc... have free parking, period.

Best base?

Your preference really. Vail is a bit faux Euro feel and generally more expensive by quite a bit. Breck does have the old mining town portion of it which many prefer, but also with huge amounts of condo's, hotels and faux mining replica buildings surrounding the original town too.

I don't really pay to stay at either (friends sofa's and guest rooms), so only can give you some limited info: Vail - I don't stay there, but know folks who stay at manor vail (near Golden Peak base) for jr ski racing events so I suspect it must be reasonable in price. It's a few block walk to the restaurants and 'true village' portion of town though. But very near a main lift. Breck - I did stay at Sundowner which is sandwiched between town and a lift (4'oclock area). ~2 long blocks, uphill to a lift, ski back to you place. Nothing special, clean, Ok furnishings but has a kitchen to cook some meals to cut down on cost, etc... Quite reasonably priced and walk a couple blocks into town for dinners, etc...

As for Skiing, Vail has better snow surface and much larger total terrain and less wind (can take a couple days to get used to figuring it out it's that big), Breck is more wide than tall and people can become annoyed going between the several mtn areas if they don't know what they are doing (hitting certain areas wrong time of day for lift lines on weekends, etc...).

I could put a lot more detailed info on that type of topic, but not sure if you are leaning one way or another, or if other items in the package will make up your mind on base area. There are a lot of central Colo ski resorts you could sample within an hour or much less of either resort.

 

[danmorgan]

Thanks to both of you for the typically comprehensive replies, that's one of the things that sets this board apart from most others, the level of knowledge and helpfulness of its participants! =D>

I'll probably go for January if possible, plus it means two months less to wait! I'll be booking as late as possible anyway so if it looks like the season is a slow starter then will go for March. Just a shame the mix of work and MBA commitments is restricting us so much :-(

Thanks for the confirmation of the lack of El Nino effect, I thought I'd got the info correct from Tony's excellent site, but wanted to check

From perusing the trail maps, Vail does look better, but the tour operators over here charge a lot more for Vail (Breck tends to start at about £700-800, whereas Vail starts at £1100) so I suspect we'll be staying in Breckenridge, plus the faux-Alpine thing will irritate me a bit I suspect :lol: That being said, we'll definitely head over to Vail for at least a couple of days, would be a waste otherwise! I'm also keen to check out A-Basin and Copper.

Cheers guys, fingers crossed for lots of snow this year!

Dan

 

[rfarren]

Remember it cost $25 a day to park your car in Vail. Just a heads up. I

 

[Tony Crocker]

the tour operators over here charge a lot more for Vail

Perhaps you should make some direct inquiries on lodging. As you know, the economy isn't great, you might find some deals. January will be your best shot there also.

 

[danmorgan]

Unfortunately its the flights that push the price up if I do it DIY, they'll come to £400-500pp but I'll definitely be checking out the direct approach since that's my preferred option anyway.

Thanks again for the help

 

[rfarren]

Unfortunately its the flights that push the price up if I do it DIY, they'll come to £400-500pp but I'll definitely be checking out the direct approach since that's my preferred option anyway.

Thanks again for the help

I don't understand why the prices would be different on flights. Breck and Vail are both closer to Eagle airport and about 20 minutes apart from each other by car. Frankly, if you're going to rent a car, you might as well fly into Denver anyways. IMHO Vail is a vastly superior mountain to Breckenridge. The town of Breckenridge is nice, but Vail's town isn't an abomination. Personally, I would rather stay in Vail, where I can walk to the mountain, and then if I wanted to go out to dinner in Breck I would drive there. Also the town of Breck is pretty high up, and you run the chance of getting pretty bad altitude sickness. I think the town of Vail is about 1,000 feet lower, which may not seem like a lot, but I do think it makes a difference when you're trying to sleep.

 

[rfarren]

DIY

Oh I see... alla carte. Still, you might be able to find some cheap flights. You may have to wait it out a bit but it's possible. Right now from JFK to DEN is about $300 I imagine that you should be able to get tickets from Europe to JFK for about $500, perhaps even less, in January.

 

[Tony Crocker]

I think the town of Vail is about 1,000 feet lower,

More like 1,500, a significant difference the first 2-3 days for about 1/4 of people.

Mid-January should be lower demand for flights than February/March. Current search on bing.com shows lowest price for Jan. 19-31 of $730 nonstop to Denver and $631 with a stop.

 

[Pajarito-Bred]

If you're set on Breck/Vail, lots of good info above, here's a couple of other bits:

If you've got 10 days of skiing, you could stay in Breck for a week, then transfer for a couple of days to Vail or Avon, rather than schlepping back and forth. If you get too enthusiastic about cheap lodging at Vail, you could end up on the wrong side of the interstate, or "lift served" at Cascade village, not walking distance from town. Breckenridge in-town is the best bet for walking-distance access to both the lifts and nightlife. Be sure to locate your proposed lodging on a map before you commit, if you'll be walking to the lifts/nitlife. Breck also has a low-budget "youth hostel" that was mostly full of Brits last time I stayed there a couple years ago.

Economics of a rental car/vs shuttle service mostly depends on the size of your group. But I'd reccomend to put the car $$ into better-located lodging so that you don't need a car, or winter-driving skills, or $25/day to park.
Picking a specific week is of course a gamble snow-wise, much depends on your tolerance for skiing in miserable weather conditions, when the snow is better but the only crowding is in the lodge. March is likely to be better and warmer weather-wise, if that's important to you.

If saving some bucks is really important Vail is the wrong place to consider. Since you're planning on 10 days, though, check out their EPIC pass this year, $439 for unlimited skiing at Breck/keystone/A-basin, plus 10 days at Vail and BC. Not sure how this compares to what you'd get with a package deal. You could get a really nice condo for cheap in Frisco or Dillon- but would need a car,they're about 6 /8 miles from Breck, actually closer to Vail and Keystone, or ditch the Vail idea and check out Steamboat or Winter Park.
Hmmm.... El Nino? time think about heading south to Taos and Telluride......

 

[q]

Well Dan, I will throw my longer distance opinion into the mix too fwiw.

I've skied at them all, they are all good fun although I have a total dislike for Breckenridge. I don't think it is worth staying more than a day or two at but thats only my opinion. Others in the UK seem to clamour for going there. I suppose it keeps them all together haha.

Anyway, whenever I have been in the area, 2 or 3 years now for anything up to 9 days if memory serves, I've based myself at The Lake Dillon Lodge in Frisco. It cost about $90 for a single huge room, has a bar and restaurant and is directly opposite the free bus service to some of the mountains and is within an easy drive of all resorts other than Vail if there is snow on Vail Pass. There is also a cheaper place right across the road but I stayed at BW as my dad and brother were there with a party from the UK. Not beside any lift but I'd imagine you getting lazy and just going to Breck every day as your at the lifts.....

Having been before I'd be at A-Basin, Loveland and a few others before Breck and I prefer Beaver Creek to Vail although earlier in the winter I guess Vail might be more to my taste.

There are a lot of really good deals in the UK normally for lodgings and free passes at Copper too which might be an option and then just have have a few days elsewhere during the trip. Copper has grown on me.

Q

 

[johnnash]

If you're trying to save money on housing, you definitely want to avoid the holiday periods like Presidents' Day and (to a lesser extent) the Spring Break period, although this is spread over several weekends, so the increase in rates isn't so bad. (And I don't think that many schoold would be having Spring Brak during your possible March period.) I also think you'll have a hard time finding cheap housing at Vail. Of course, at Vail or any destination resort, the rent gradient is pretty steep as you move away from the ski-in/ out to walk-to-lifts- to take-a-shuttle housing. If you really want to save on housing, you can base in some of the nearby towns, like Frisco or Silverthorne. The disadvantage is that you have to drive and pay parking (although there's also some bus transportation if you can be flexible), but the advantage is that you can ski different places every day, which seems to me one of the great things about skiing this part of Colorado. If I were in the area for 10 days, I would certainly spend a day or 2 at Copper. My family also likes Keystone (which is in the Vail Group).

We've had good luck searching for condos on VRBO.COM. When you find several places that look interesting, send the owners a message (the website makes it very easy to send the same inquiry on many different properties) and ask about a discount. Many owners are willing to cut a good deal (much cheaper than the posted rate on the website) for long stays or during slack periods or at the last minute. To save on lift tix, you should look at the Vail Group's Epic Pass as someone suggested. (I think the price is currently $599). For Copper and A-Basin, look on Ebay.com, and search for "lift tickets". You can often find coupons for tix at around $50/ day for Copper and less for A-Basin. (And I think A-Basin may be included in the Epic Pass, even though I don't think it's one of the Vail Group per se.) For a car, search Kayak.com and carrentals.com, find your best deal (usually one of the off-brands, like Advantage, Enterprise, or Fox) and reserve it (no deposit required). Then as you get close to your trip, check for last-minute specials.

 

[danmorgan]

Hi all, thanks for the many informative posts, only downside is that now I have more thinking to do, but at least its planning a snowboarding holiday rather than work! I hadn't really considered staying in Frisco/Dillon/Silverthorne, but the more I think about it the more sense it seems to make, especially if I end up doing a DIY job.

Thanks again,

Dan

 

[Geoff]

If saving some bucks is really important Vail is the wrong place to consider. Since you're planning on 10 days, though, check out their EPIC pass this year, $439 for unlimited skiing at Breck/keystone/A-basin, plus 10 days at Vail and BC.

You are describing the "Colorado Pass" product. That can only be purchased in-person before, I think, mid-November. You can renew it over the internet but you have to buy your first one in Colorado. The EPIC Pass is $599 and is targeted at the non-locals to get them to ski a week in Colorado and then return for a long weekend or two.


A couple of things:
I'm not sure why people aren't suggesting Beaver Creek instead of Breckenridge. There is frequent bus service at $4.00 each way between the two resorts so you don't have to change lodging and you can get by without a car. It's way more challenging to get between Vail and Breck without a car. If you can find a good bundled price on airfare, lodging, and lift tickets, Vail is just fine.
http://www.eaglecounty.us/uploadedFiles ... it_map.pdf

Avoid of Martin Luther King Day on Monday January 18th. That 3-day weekend is very busy.

 

[lookn4powder]

Hi all, thanks for the many informative posts, only downside is that now I have more thinking to do, but at least its planning a snowboarding holiday rather than work! I hadn't really considered staying in Frisco/Dillon/Silverthorne, but the more I think about it the more sense it seems to make, especially if I end up doing a DIY job.

Thanks again,

Dan

You've received a lot of great advice, but here are a couple other things to consider:

1) Jet Lag. (I am reminded of this problem, as I spent today recovering from my return last night from Berlin.) A quick check on London-Denver flights shows that most flights arrive in Denver between 5-9 PM, which is well after midnight to the UK traveler. Assuming you do the "rental car shuffle" at DEN, it will be at least another hour before you leave the airport and another 30-50 minutes before you reach a local motel. Your party would benefit by staying in Denver the first night. Don't even think about reaching Summit County that night. Don't despair this delay, because staying in Denver helps you with your next issue:

2) Altitude. I believe that the highest altitude in the UK is 899 m (2,949 ft); the lowest altitude in Colorado is 1,035 m (3,397 ft). Summit County towns lie around 2,800 m (9,200 ft). You should include strategies for handling potential problems with altitude. Any altitude problems may be compounded by the 7 hour time shift between UK--CO. Anyone in your party who knows they are susceptible to altitude problems should arrive with suitable prescription drugs (and take them).

Sleeping your first night(s) at lower altitude will make a world of difference for adapting to altitude. Most likely, part or all of your party will be hung over the next morning from travel fatigue, so your group will get a slow start the first morning after arriving. You might consider following strategies my wife and I follow. When skiing CO, we stay the first night at a La Quinta Motel in Golden, CO (just off I-70 near Golden) after arriving at DEN AP. From this location at the base of the Front Range (about 5,500 m (1,675 ft)) we drive up to Loveland or Mary Jane (aka Winter Park) ski areas and ski a half day; then we move on to Summit County. Alternately, we sometimes ski Mary Jane (great bumps!) and then drive up to Steamboat at 6,732 ft (2,052 m) and ski for 2-3 days before driving over to Summit County. A few days sleeping at the lower altitude at Steamboat helps with altitude adaptation, and Steamboat is usually in good shape by Feb (don't know about Jan). The routes for these drives are fairly direct and unchallenging (except during storms), and with this itinerary you will see very un-British high plains desert environments.

3) Car rental prices. According to a recent survey, car rental prices have risen 73% in the US since Sept 2008. Apparently, the recession has dropped car demand, but the rental companies have responded by reducing supply and by eliminating competition through mergers. I don't have any experience of how this has played out in ski country--but rental cars costs rose enough last season that my wife and I found it worth taking some trips to resort towns that don't require a rental car, e.g, Crested Butte, Telluride, Mammoth (CA), Alta, Snowbird, Park City, or Whistler.

Hope this helps.

Jeff

 

[q]

Coming from the UK I had always previously used Argus Rentals for my car hire. I found them to be the cheapest to include CDW and unlimited miles.

However, the last couple winters I've found Car Hire 3000 to be the cheapest by a mile. I paid £615 for a 4x4 for 27 days including unlimited miles, CDW and all the usual stuff. £75 deposit paid, rest paid in February I think from memory. It is normally Alamo that I pick the vehicle up from and going direct with them is well over £1000.

 

[danmorgan]

Thanks again guys, I've done a bit of searching on Frisco/Dillon/Silverthorne and think I'll probably go for Frisco out of the three of them.

Although I'd read a bit about it, I hadn't really thought that much about the effects of the altitude, but staying one night in Denver might be a good move, along with the obvious bits around taking it easy and not drinking too much at the start.

Cheers all, fingers crossed for good snow!