The Post will update this list regularly as areas open.

Colorado 2024-2025 ski area open dates

Arapahoe Basin: As soon as conditions allow in October

Keystone: mid-October, pending early season conditions

Loveland: As soon as conditions allow in late October or early November

Winter Park: As soon as conditions allow in late October or early November

Breckenridge: Nov. 8

Copper Mountain: Nov. 8

Vail: Nov. 15

Eldora: Nov. 15

Purgatory: Nov. 16

Monarch: As soon as conditions allow in November

Steamboat: Nov. 23

Beaver Creek: Nov. 27

Crested Butte: Nov. 27

Aspen: Nov. 28

Snowmass: Nov. 28

Telluride: Nov. 28

Granby Ranch: Nov. 28

Powderhorn: Nov 29

Howelsen Hill: Nov. 30

Sunlight: As soon as conditions allow in early December

Echo Mountain: As soon as conditions allow in December

Ski Cooper: Dec. 11

Aspen Highlands: Dec. 14

Buttermilk: Dec. 14

TBD: Wolf Creek, Silverton

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, The Adventurist, to get outdoors news sent straight to your inbox.

Eldora’s owner, Powdr Corp. of Park City, Utah, announced last week that it had reached an agreement to sell Killington Resort in Vermont to an unspecified owner, and that it was putting Eldora up for sale along with Mount Bachelor in Oregon and SilverStar in British Columbia. Powdr’s announcement said the privately held company intended to retain Copper Mountain and Snowbird resort in Utah.

Tregaskis is seeking to reassure the Eldora community that there is “no cause for alarm,” that the ski area is profitable, and that it should be “a very attractive purchase” for potential buyers. Eldora will open a new lodge in the base area this winter that will house a children’s ski school, a home for Ignite Adaptive Sports, restrooms and food-and-beverage facilities.

Eldora has 680 acres of skiable terrain with four dozen trails, along with a Nordic center for cross-country skiing. It is the only Colorado ski area with regular RTD service from the Front Range.

“I want to assure you that Eldora will conduct business as usual this winter, with no changes to the upcoming season,” Tregaskis wrote. “Eldora will remain on the Ikon Pass and continue providing access through its own passes and day tickets.

“Eldora’s hardworking staff will continue to serve the community with the same dedication we always have, and Eldora will remain the same backyard winter playground for Nederland, greater Boulder, and Colorado’s northern Front Range,” he added.

Powdr acquired Copper Mountain in 2009 and Eldora in 2016. Little is known about Powdr’s finances because it is not publicly traded, but Patrick Scholes, a Wall Street analyst for Truist Securities who focuses on lodging and leisure companies, including ski resorts, said he hasn’t “heard anything that Powdr has had financial difficulties.

“Eldora is extremely unique, given its proximity to Denver. I have to imagine demand is strong, with University of Colorado students,” he continued.

Powdr said the reason for selling four of its nine ski areas is to “strategically manage Powdr’s portfolio in alignment with our founder’s and stakeholders’ goals,” adding that the company aims to “balance our ski business with new ventures in the national parks sector and Woodward.”

Woodward is an “adventure lifestyle” company with action-sports programming at Copper Mountain, Park City, Snowbird and six other resorts. Powdr already has concessionaire contracts with Death Valley and Zion national parks, and it plans to bid for more.

“The concessions we run at Death Valley are a motel called Stovepipe, a gas station, and convenience store,” said Stacey Hutchinson, communications vice president for Powdr. “Zion will be Zion Lodge. POWDR has grown a great hospitality business over the three decades since our inception, mostly on (forest service) land, so we’ll apply our expertise to national parks. And, it presents an opportunity for us to provide year-round employment to our seasonal workers — this would let us provide health insurance and other benefits.”

Eldora is not the only Colorado ski area for sale. In February, Denver-based Alterra Mountain Corp. announced an agreement to buy Arapahoe Basin. That transaction is still pending while the U.S. Justice Department considers whether the sale presents antitrust issues.

Powdr bought Eldora from a trio of investors — Bill Killebrew, whose family sold California’s Heavenly ski area to Japanese investors in 1990, Chuck Lewis, who founded Copper in 1972, and Graham Anderson, a former Sun Valley ski racer. The trio bought it in 1991 when it was on the brink of closure, investing heavily in snowmaking and other upgrades.

“I have been through three different sales in my long career in ski-resort management, the most recent being the purchase of Eldora by Powdr in 2016,” Tregaskis wrote. “In every case, the new owners brought positive change and financial investment.

“Eldora itself has had several different owners since it was founded in 1962, and every owner invested heavily in Eldora’s infrastructure and guest experience,” he added. “The bottom line? While a new owner has yet to be identified, I am very optimistic that the next stewards of this special place will inject excitement and a new wave of capital investment.”

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, The Adventurist, to get outdoors news sent straight to your inbox.

You might have a good feel for which two teams have the most talent, but what if one loses its star quarterback to a season-ending injury in November? You also might know that La Niña winters often result in above-average snowfall for Colorado’s high country, but sometimes La Niña winters result in well-below-average snow. That’s why meteorologists hedge when predicting conditions before Labor Day. Nevertheless, they try.

“I think the sports analogy is great,” says Alan Smith, a full-time meteorologist for the OpenSnow forecasting and reporting service. “You’re predicting future events, and you’re taking information that you have, but there’s so much information you don’t have, like injuries. You never know if a player on a team is going to suddenly explode that season – or regress.”

Still, anyone with an Epic or Ikon pass can’t help but wonder what kind of winter we will have. Labor Day is less than two weeks away, and the first Colorado ski area openings are apt to come in mid-October, most likely on man-made snow. So Smith provided his tentative 2024-2025 United States Winter Forecast Preview on the OpenSnow website.

Usually forecasts this time of year focus on the fluctuation of El Niño and La Niña in the eastern Pacific Ocean near the equator. Last ski season played out during a weak El Niño. Currently we’re in a transitional “neutral” status, but not for long.

“La Niña is favored to emerge during September-November (66% chance) and persist through the Northern Hemisphere winter 2024-25 (74% chance during November-January),” according to the Climate Prediction Center of the National Weather Service, which has issued a La Niña watch.

What does that mean for skiers and snowboarders in Colorado? Like betting on the Super Bowl this time of year, it’s all about the odds.

“El Niño and La Niña tend to get rated from weak to moderate to strong,” Smith said. “We never know for sure, but the trends seem to be pointing toward a weaker episode this year.”

Smith researched the six most recent weak La Niñas to see how Colorado resorts fared.

“Four of the six years were snowier than average, so that’s pretty decent odds,” Smith said. “However, one of those was well-below average. “That was in 2017-18, a very dry winter. If you expand it out to look at all La Niña years, Colorado does seem to have a boom-or-bust potential with La Niña.

“It tips the odds slightly in favor of being an above-average winter in the ski regions of Colorado,”  he continued. “But sometimes the winters that end up below average that are La Niñas can be well below average.”

The winter of 2021-22 was a moderate La Niña and snowfall was decent, featuring a slow start but strong spring snows. The winter of 2022-23 was a weak La Niña that capped off a rare three-year “triple dip” La Niña. That was a fantastic season for Colorado resorts.

“November was cold and snowy,” Smith said of the 2022-23 winter. “It really jump-started the season, and it was consistent all season long — one of the most consistent winters I remember seeing.”

Last winter, under a strong El Niño, was slightly above average for snowfall. Now we get to guess the odds for this winter.

“There’s just so many factors you don’t know,” Smith said. “If you’re just looking at history, the odds tell us it’s slightly better than a 50-50 chance of being an above-average winter. But there’s always going to be that chance it could be a well-below-average winter.”

Colorado’s first ski area opening dates over the past five seasons

2019: Arapahoe Basin, Oct. 11

2020: Wolf Creek, Oct. 28

2021: Wolf Creek, Oct. 16

2022: Arapahoe Basin, Oct. 23

2023: Arapahoe Basin, Oct. 29

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, The Adventurist, to get outdoors news sent straight to your inbox.

For the past 13 years, Powder Daze lured Front Range skiers and snowboarders during the summer heat to its Littleton store, which would be crammed with last year’s skis, boards and boots at clearance prices. Powder Daze continued a Colorado skier ritual that began in the 1950s when Gart Bros. invented the Labor Day ski sale. Just last year, Christy’s director of brand marketing, Randy England, was touting an expanded Powder Daze at the Littleton store that was a combination winter gear kickoff sale and snow sports expo.

Not this year, though. The Littleton store and other Front Range Christy locations will have summer inventory on their floors — primarily, patio furniture — when Powder Daze begins Friday as an online ski and snowboard sale. Summer goods in Christy stores will be on sale for up to 50% off, while ski and snowboard gear online will be on sale for up to 60% off. A limited amount of last season’s ski gear will be available in Littleton and some Colorado mountain stores.

England is calling it an “End of Summer Event,” while hinting that in-store ski and snowboard sales are coming in October.

“We want to meet the guests where they are now, in season, and not try to anticipate what they may want on a promotional level in the off-season,” England said. “If we think back to the old days of the (Gart Bros.) Sports Castle downtown in Denver, and people standing around in 98-degree parking lots, it’s hard to get excited about putting on a ski jacket when you’re about to pass out.”

Rival Epic Mountain Gear will begin its Epic Drop sale on Friday, which marks a shift for the company. The past two years, Epic didn’t begin its ski and snowboard discount extravaganza until Labor Day weekend.

“We know what our friends next door are doing,” England said of Epic. “It’s great for them. I hope they’re wildly successful on that shift.”

Christy Sports, meanwhile, is focused on moving summer goods now and pushing ski sales closer to ski season.

“We loved our times in the legacy of what Gart started,” England said. “But we want to operate our business in-season and give our guests things they can use now. We’re happy to sell skis, we have them available year-round, but I’d rather get you excited about something you can walk out the door and use right away.”

England said the decision also is related to trends and marketing pressures in the outdoor industry as a whole following COVID.

“The outdoor industry saw a huge boom,” England said. “That boom did not continue, as booms generally do not, because consumers had gear and the industry was trying to catch up with supply-chain challenges to the point where there was a glut of inventory. In the last year or two, as you can see from all the big players, from REI to everybody else, everyone is making an adjustment to get back to a level baseline.”

For Christy, with 35 stores in four states, each store is focused on moving summer inventory, which varies in type depending on the region. In resort locations that can mean bikes or mountain apparel. In the Pacific Northwest, it’s gear related to water sports. In Denver it means patio furniture.

Epic Mountain Gear is offering discounts of up to 60% on skis, snowboards, bikes, accessories and apparel. The Epic Drop sale will run from Friday through Sept. 22. The purchase of any new bicycle from participating Epic Mountain Gear shops — excluding the Frisco store — entitles the buyer to free annual tune-ups with 25-point safety checks and standard adjustments.

Through Epic Mountain Gear’s Junior Trade program, parents can buy new or used gear for their kids during the Epic Drop sale at discounted prices. When their kids outgrow that set of gear, parents can trade it in for new gear and get a credit worth 50% of the original purchase price. Junior Trade prices will increase in October. Appointments are highly recommended.

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, The Adventurist, to get outdoors news sent straight to your inbox.

Breckenridge is scheduled to open Nov. 8 and Vail on Nov. 15. Beaver Creek and Crested Butte are slated to open on Nov. 27, the day before Thanksgiving.

Keystone will be the first to open. The announcement says it will open in mid-October “pending early season conditions,” which are mostly dependent on the progress of snowmaking. Usually that means sustained temperatures in the 20s, although snow can be made in the 30s when humidity is low.

The deadline to lock in Epic Passes prices before they increase comes on Sept. 2. Currently the Epic Pass is priced at $1,004 and the Epic Local Pass at $746. Epic Day passes make it possible to ski for $73-$95 per day, depending on the mountain and number of days selected. When passes went on sale at early-bird prices in March, the Epic Pass was priced at $982 and the Epic Local Pass was $731.

Vail Resorts also is launching a gear-rental membership program called My Epic Gear, which will allow guests to select gear they want to rent through an app and have it delivered to them if they are staying at lodging within a resort area. If not, they will be able to pick it up and drop it off with a slopeside valet service, eliminating the need to stand in line at ski shops. It debuted as a pilot program last year at Keystone, Breckenridge, Vail and Beaver Creek for a limited number of Epic Pass holders, but this year it will be available at those four resorts plus Crested Butte, Park City, Whistler Blackcomb, Heavenly, Northstar, Stowe, Okemo and Mount Snow. Memberships will cost $50. The daily use fee will be $55 for adults and $45 for children.

Beaver Creek will expand its slate of World Cup ski racing at Beaver Creek in December to include women for the first time since the 2015 world championships. Vail native Mikaela Shiffrin and the other U.S. women downhill and super-G racers will be there Dec. 14-15. The men will race downhill, super-G and giant slalom as usual, Dec. 6-8.

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, The Adventurist, to get outdoors news sent straight to your inbox.

The Glenwood Springs resident is a Marine Corps veteran who lost her left leg and suffered other serious injuries in a helicopter crash on her second tour in Afghanistan in 2012. But in the wake of that life-altering trauma, the 33-year-old found a calling as a world-class mountaineer, competitive snowboarder and leader of a non-profit focused on outdoor therapy.

Ennis has conquered six of the Seven Summits, and her newfound fire on the mountain was evident, falls and all, from her first big climb at Mount Kilimanjaro in 2017.

“You would hear her fall or stumble and it would sound like it hurt,” recalled ex-NFLer Chris Long, who climbed Kilimanjaro with Ennis as part of a group with the non-profit Waterboys. “But in Kirstie fashion, it was like, help her up at your own risk. Because she was going to be like, ‘Get the (expletive) out of my way.’

“On the descent, we had to get down a scree and walk through a bunch of ravines and dry creeks that are difficult for anybody, and for an amputee, it’s not very fun at all. … But she just put her head down. She was motoring through it and she was not going to be denied. That’s the way she was from the time she stepped on the mountain to the time she got down to the parking lot. And that’s the way she lives her life.”

Ennis’ Marine roots

Ennis joined the Marine Corps at 17 and got her parents to sign her enlistment paperwork by telling them she was going to take a desk job.

That was a lie.

Ennis became a helicopter door gunner and airframe mechanic instead, rising to the rank of sergeant. The daughter of two Marines, Ennis was set on a lifetime of service in the corps, but that all changed on June 23, 2012, when her CH-53D helicopter crashed during a mission in the Helmand province.

Ennis suffered a traumatic brain injury in the crash. It destroyed her jaw and teeth, tore her shoulders from their sockets, blew out her eardrums, fractured her spine in multiple spots, and mangled and snapped her left leg so badly that it eventually resulted in amputation below the knee.

From her hospital bed in San Diego, Ennis struggled to process her injuries.

“Initially the petty side of me wasn’t worried about whether I was going to go forward and have a career,” Ennis recalled. “I’m thinking about, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m totally disfigured, what’s my life going to look like? Who is going to find me attractive? Can I wear a dress? Can I wear heels?'”

Ennis said she didn’t get the emotional support she needed while in the hospital, and on her first “alive day” — one year to the date of the crash — she attempted to kill herself.

“I didn’t see a point in putting myself through any more suffering or potentially make any other people suffer,” Ennis said. “When I was unsuccessful, my dad came to visit me, crying. He’s a big, tough dude who doesn’t do that. He said to me, ‘You’ve got to be kidding me. The enemy couldn’t kill you, so now you’re going to do it for them?’

“That’s when the light bulb went off. … If I can’t live for myself, then I damn sure need to live for (other American soldiers) who never made it home.”

Reclaiming her life

From that nadir, Ennis started reclaiming her life.

She began by trying snowboarding, a foreign sport for someone who spent much of her youth in Florida. She was immediately hooked and took a leap of faith by moving to Winter Park in 2014 to train with the National Sports Center for the Disabled.

In her new home state, Ennis flourished in snowboarding and hoped to compete in the 2018 Winter Paralympics in PyeongChang. But that dream was derailed late in 2015 when a slate of infections in her residual limb nearly took her life.

She underwent surgery on Dec. 23 of that year to have her knee removed. Doctors told her they might need to amputate all the way up through her hip.

When Ennis awoke on Christmas, she still had her hip, but she was now an above-knee amputee. That brought a new set of challenges. But even with that setback, she persevered.

“I knew I could be upset about everything that I’ve lost, including my knee, but now I have to make the conscious choice every single day to focus on what I’ve gained,” Ennis said. “All the possibilities of life were still there. Everything that I do, it doesn’t have to look like everybody else. It might take me a little bit longer, or it might look a little bit different, but I can still accomplish what everybody else is doing. I just have to take the time to figure it out.”

That’s exactly what Ennis has done, even as she’s endured 48 surgeries since that fateful crash and twice had to re-learn how to walk.

When doctors wouldn’t clear her to return to competitive snowboarding about 15 months after the surgery to remove her knee, Ennis turned to mountaineering. That’s when she summited Kilimanjaro, and then Carstensz Pyramid in Indonesia not long after that.

Even with the stability challenges on the mountain, and other painful side-effects such as blistering from her prosthetic, Ennis discovered she was a natural in extreme hiking environments.

“When I realized that Kilimanjaro and Carstensz were two the Seven Summits,” Ennis said, referencing the highest mountains on each of Earth’s seven continents, “I wasn’t going to stop.”

A different form of service

As Ennis got going on her climbing journey, she also started her own non-profit. The Kirstie Ennis Foundation launched in 2018, and the 501(c)(3) focuses on recreational therapy clinics and expeditions as well as providing prosthetics to underserved communities.

“My passion is being in the outdoors and looking at mobility, and movement in general, as medicine,” Ennis said. “I don’t think healing has to take place within four walls of a hospital. That definitely didn’t work for me, and neither did traditional therapy. What saved my life was getting outside.”

After her medical retirement from the Marine Corps left Ennis feeling directionless, her foundation provided a north star.

It’s a different form of service than she imagined when she first enlisted in the Marines, but one that fulfills her desire to show “anybody who was ever been the underdog (that) we can overcome whatever life throws at us.”

The foundation puts on annual clinics for women’s veteran snowboarders and amputee rock climbers. It’s also hosted clinics for amputee/veteran mountain bikers, adaptive off-roaders and sit-skiers. Foundation coordinator Megan Salisbury said clinics for paddle boarding and jujitsu are also under consideration.

Participation in the clinics is funded by the foundation, including travel, food, lodging and gear to take home. Hundreds apply and about five are selected for each clinic. To pay for the clinics and other therapeutic expeditions and services, the foundation spent an average of $121,044 from 2020-22, according to Colorado Secretary of State records.

“We don’t want them to think about anything other than being here to bond, and heal, and experience it, and we want to help them find outlets to get them back to living how they deserve to,” Salisbury said. “We’ve had some climbing clinic participants now competing in national and international events, and we’ve had other amputee climbers who came through the clinic who are now creating clinics in their hometown for adaptive athletes to be able to get out and move their bodies and push what’s possible.”

Both Allie Redshaw and Amanda Tallman are examples of the long-term impact Ennis’ clinics have.

Redshaw, a 34-year-old chef from Virginia, lost her right hand in a meat grinder in 2017. She attended one of Ennis’ adaptive rock climbing clinics in 2018, the first time she tried the sport. Redshaw said Ennis “meets you where you are in your healing journey,” and that Ennis’ follow-up with her after the clinic fueled her rise in the sport.

Over the last six years, Redshaw’s become a competitive climber, including for Team USA paraclimbing and in IFSC World Cups.

“I got a call from Kirstie after the clinic, who just said, ‘I see something in you. If you like climbing, I think climbing likes you, and I think you should keep doing it. I can help guide you through that experience, whatever that looks like,'” Redshaw said.

“And I can’t tell you the amount of times I’ve called Kirstie and been like, ‘I think I should give this up. I’m terrible at this. I’m not getting first, so I’m last.’ She’s helped me to navigate that really well. … She helps remind me that I’m not going to be perfect at it, but I need to keep showing up.”

For Tallman, a 36-year-old U.S. Army veteran from Arizona, her participation in Ennis’ first women’s veteran snowboarding clinic in 2020 changed her life. Tallman said the experience gave her purpose when she was struggling with her mental health after medically retiring from the Army, and it eventually motivated her to found her own non-profit to help veterans.

“I fell so many times during that trip and I thought I would never learn how to snowboard,” Tallman recalled. “But Kirstie just had this essence of like, you fall down, you get back up. … I just had to get up and keep going down the mountain, whatever that looked like, and that mindset is because of Kirstie and the inspiration she instilled in me.”

Ennis’ future on the mountain

Aside from her mountaineering exploits, Ennis has plenty of other pursuits to keep her busy.

Described by Long as a “renaissance woman,” Ennis’ primary income comes from motivational speaking. She’s also earned three master’s degrees, is working on a doctorate, serves as a volunteer firefighter and has started the process of getting her pilot’s license as part of a pursuit to become an aerial firefighter.

She once walked 1,000 miles over 72 days through the United Kingdom in honor of fallen Marines. She was a stuntwoman in the movie “Patriots Day.” And all along, she’s been the face of the limb-different movement, appearing on the cover of the ESPN Body Issue and garnering induction into the International Sports Hall of Fame.

But as Long emphasizes, Ennis’ fiery Type A personality is mirrored by a different side, one defined by empathy.

“I remember her connecting with the young girls in the villages (along the Kilimanjaro hike),” Long said. “The little girls would flock to her and thought she was the coolest person in the world. So there’s ‘Kirstie on the mountain,’ and ‘Kirstie in the village.’ ‘Kirstie on the mountain’ is why she’s powerful, but ‘Kirstie in the village’ is why she resonates with so many people.”

Kirstie on the mountain still has one last summit to scale.

In 2025, she’ll make her third attempt at Everest, the final of the Seven Summits she needs to achieve. It will likely be a speed climb, over one month instead of the usual two. She had to turn back about 600 feet from the summit on each of her first two cracks at the world’s tallest mountain.

In 2019, it was because her climbing partners ran out of oxygen. Last year, 55-mph winds and temperatures as frigid as 35 degrees below zero forced her to turn back.

“The first time I turned around was to protect my team,” Ennis said. “Last time, I turned around in self-preservation.”

Ennis is still hoping for her snowboarding shot, with eyes on making the 2026 Winter Paralympics in Italy. She recently rejoined the Team USA snowboarding development pipeline and will need to perform well on the race circuit over the next couple of winters in order to have a chance at qualifying.

Through all of her individual goals, Redshaw and others close to Ennis believe she’s just getting started “as an ambassador on the front line of survivors.”

“Metaphorically, her next step could be to go to the moon,” said LP Panasewicz, Ennis’ friend and the director of development for the non-profit Range of Motion Project. “She’s already helped or impacted thousands of people, and she’ll surely reach thousands more. She’ll accomplish anything she wants to.”

That would give The Legend Colorado’s longest ski season — as usual — having begun on Oct. 29 and lasting 222 days.

The area will be closed Monday through Wednesday the next two weeks but will be open Friday through Sunday. Live music is planned for closing day.

Lifts run 8:30 a.m. until 2 p.m. The 6th Alley bar is open from 11 a.m. unti 3 p.m. Details are available on the Arapahoe Basin website.

Looking forward, guided wildflower hikes will be offered every other Monday beginning July 8, and mountaintop yoga classes will be held on Tuesdays and Thursdays beginning July 9 from 10-11 a.m.at Black Mountain Lodge.

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, The Adventurist, to get outdoors news sent straight to your inbox.

Winter Park will mark its second-longest season at 207 days, exceeded only by last year’s 211 days. The Grand County resort has recorded 406 inches of snowfall through the season. Snow depth at the top of the mountain is more than five and a half feet, and mid-mountain depth is four and a half feet.

Mary Jane Beach will hold a celebration event on Saturday.

Arapahoe Basin officials announced on Tuesday that The Legend will remain open until at least June 9. The plan is for it to be open daily through June 2, closed June 3-6, and open again the weekend of June 7-9. If not longer.

“If conditions look good, we go for another weekend,” according to an A-Basin news release, which asked spring skiers and riders to “remain vigilant” with an eye to changing conditions.

“Yes, spring skiing brings lots of fun, relaxed days on the Beach,” the release said. “But (with) ever-changing spring conditions, from goggle-tans to the occasional storm rolling in, you never really know what you’re going to get. Snow surface conditions can change rapidly, and our patrol is constantly monitoring every part of the mountain. Be prepared and most importantly, respect all signage and closures.”

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, The Adventurist, to get outdoors news sent straight to your inbox.

Nationwide, numbers declined by 5 million skiers and riders. Numbers in the Rocky Mountain Region, which includes Utah, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Arizona and New Mexico in addition to Colorado, declined 5%.

The numbers were released Wednesday at the NSAA’s national convention in Frisco, Texas. NSAA, which has its headquarters in Lakewood, does not break out numbers by state. Colorado’s numbers will be released by Colorado Ski Country USA at its annual meeting on June 6.

In a news release, NSAA noted that unseasonably warm temperatures delayed the start of the ski season in much of the country.

“Some ski area operators described the season as a roller coaster, and I applaud those same operators for being flexible, reopening to take advantage of a late-season storm or making snow in late March to squeeze in one more week,” NSAA president Kelly Pawlak said in a news release. “Skiers are a hardy bunch, and responded enthusiastically.”

While snowfall was excellent across much of Colorado, that was not the case in many regions of the country. The average snowfall for U.S. ski areas was 158 inches, a 30% decline from last season. Thirteen Colorado ski areas received in excess of 300 inches, led by Steamboat (425) and Winter Park (398).

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, The Adventurist, to get outdoors news sent straight to your inbox.

Breckenridge wants to build one from the Peak 9 base to an angled mid-station, where a new on-mountain beginner area would be developed, before continuing upward to terminate near the top of the existing A-Chair. The A-Chair would then be removed.

Winter Park proposes to build one from the main base area to the Discovery Park learning area. It would replace the existing Gemini Express, a detachable quad.

Both projects are currently in an official public comment period, as required for forest service approval. The comment period for the Breckenridge project ends on June 13, while the comment period for Winter Park’s proposal ends on June 15. Forest service decisions are expected for Breckenridge in December and Winter Park in March.

“After projects on Peak 7 and Peak 8, we look forward to turning our focus to Peak 9 and are excited that our Peak 9 project proposal has been accepted for review by the USFS,” said Jon Copeland, Breckenridge’s vice president and chief operating officer, in a statement.

“This project aligns with our resort’s priorities to continue to improve flow and circulation across our five peaks, specifically in and around our base areas and main portals to the mountain, focusing on upgrades that make our resort better versus bigger,” he added.

According to a summary posted by the White River National Forest, the proposed Breckenridge gondola would originate adjacent to the lower terminal of the QuickSilver SuperChair at the Peak 9 base and run alongside it, reducing congestion which can be considerable there and at the nearby Beaver Run base. In addition, Breckenridge wants to build a new learning area that would include two short conveyors for beginners, a warming hut with restrooms and additional snowmaking. Also in its plans is replacing C-Chair, a slow double, with a six-person high-speed chair.

A summary of the Winter Park proposal posted by the Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests lists several other improvements the resort wants to make in addition to the gondola, which likely would be spread out over several years. They include a new restaurant on Vasquez Ridge, lift replacements and upgrades, trail improvements and additional snowmaking. The restaurant would replace a small chili hut.

Winter Park spokeswoman Jen Miller didn’t offer a timeline for the improvements, once they are approved.

“This is a multi-year process,” Miller said, “and a multi-year plan.”

Eventually, the resort wants to build another gondola between the town of Winter Park and the Discovery Park area, which would become the ski area’s third entry portal and transform the way that visitors access Winter Park.

“I wouldn’t call it another base area, but it (would be) another arrival point,” Miller said. “Then you would be able to access other lifts. It would be a third arrival point, if you’re counting the Winter Park base and Mary Jane base.”

The town gondola is still in the concept stage and is not part of the current public comment process, but the improvements being planned for Discovery Park would be made with the eventual construction of the town gondola in mind.

Details on the proposed projects at Breckenridge, and how to comment on them, are available through the White River National Forest. The Winter Park documents are available through the Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests. A public open house will be held at Winter Park’s Balcony House on May 29 from 6-8 p.m.

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, The Adventurist, to get outdoors news sent straight to your inbox.