[Pyrites]

I remember thinking my Svea 123 was an expensive buy.

A couple gallons of gas, and for two of us spending the night at Maple Flats was as cheap as a movie.

[Brian R]

[treeswarper]

Jinx's Boy needs to chime in here. 

I'm thinking that the leases are for a fairly long number of years.  I also think a percentage, but not much, of their profits goes back to the Treasury. 

The way to ski, if you can't afford it, is to work at the ski hill.  Even the Loup has a program where you can volunteer to work and after a certain number of hours, get a season pass. 

I worked at White Pass for a winter, back in the "hippy" days and that's where I really started learning to ski.   Funny, Dave Mahre AKA Spike, used to call us hippies. 

Then, I worked at the Loup as a ski instructor and got "free" skiing in.  We don't have so many little hills for kidlets now.  Squilchuck, just out of Wenatchee used to have a few rope tows going and was an alternative to the high lift ticket prices at Mission Ridge.  It doesn't operate anymore.  There also was a rope tow area up the Entiat Valley.  We now have Loup Loup, which has a slow chair, Badger Mountain, Sitzmark and (not sure on this one) Echo Valley?  These are non profit hills run by local organizations.  I cannot think of any on the west side of the state, unless Hurricane Ridge runs.

The Loup is on Forest Service land.  Badger Mtn?  May be on state land.  Sitzmark is on private land.

--------------
What's especially fun about sock puppets is that you can make each one unique and individual, so that they each have special characters. And they don't have to be human––animals and aliens are great possibilities

[cascadeclimber]

[RichP]

[Olympic Hiker]

[Malachai Constant]

We used to take the family to Crystal for Christmas week leaving on Christmas Day as it was before the rates when up. They kept raising housing and lift rates. After the Whistler Olympics it became cheaper to go there and the skiing was much better, the invisible hand made housing substantially cheaper and much newer. Crystal is a near monopoly with only the No. 2 lift at Alpy being somewhat competitive but overcrowded.

--------------
"You do not laugh when you look at the mountains, or when you look at the sea." Lafcadio Hearn

[altasnob]

Crystal season pass this season is $600, including tax. If my memory is correct, it was over $1,000 back in the 2000s. Factor in inflation and cost of living adjustment, and a season pass is an absolute bargain compared to what it was. On top of that, a season pass gives you 5 free ski days at Alpental/Snoqualmie, Mt. Bachelor, Red Mountain, BC, and dozens of other resorts worldwide. So the Crystal acquisition by Alterra and monopolization of the ski resort industry has not been all bad. It has been way more crowded up at Crystal since Alterra took over though.

The bean counters working for big ski resorts have decided the way to maximize profits is to charge outrageous day ticket prices for the casual skier, but make season passes very cheap comparatively. Crystal's day tickets are expensive, but so are tickets at every other major ski area in North America.

If you want to ski Crystal for a day find someone who has a season pass as each season pass holder has eight 25% off vouchers to give out. Also, night skiing is a pretty good deal at Crystal. It starts at 2 pm and if you start skiing at 2 pm sharp you can get a couple hours on the upper mountain before the upper lifts close around 3:30 to 4:00, then ski Gold Hills and Quicksilver under the lights until 8 pm. An no reservations required for night skiing this year, unlike day tickets. They use flex pricing like Mariners games and airline tickets so pay less to ski on random days.

[jinx'sboy]

[Owler]