Recently my local news station broadcast that Breckenridge is the most popular ski resort in the United States. Frankly, that has always surprised me.

Part of me doesn’t want to even write this article. I would love to see people continue to go to Breckenridge by choice and to ignore the other ski areas in Summit and Eagle Counties. I think that Arapahoe Basin, Copper Mountain, Keystone, Vail and Beaver Creek are crowded enough as it is.

But then, I tell myself that the one of the purposes of Epinions is to provide real information to consumers to help them make better purchasing decisions.

So I’m in a bit of a quandary.

I can ski Breckenridge for free any day I want for the entire ski season. How’s that possible? I have a season pass that gets me into any Vail Associates ski area called the Colorado Card. I can ski Arapahoe Basin, Keystone and Breckenridge free, and I get ten free ski days at Vail and Beaver Creek. It’s an awesome deal when you consider that the pass only costs $299.00. The way I figure it, my season pass is paid off by December, and so skiing from about Christmas to the end of the season is free. I’m up in the hills almost every weekend except holiday weekends.

And parking at Breckenridge is free. At Vail parking costs $10.00 mid-week and $12.00 on weekends. You can park free at Arapahoe Basin, Keystone and Copper Mountain. You’d think that with the free parking and free skiing, I’d be choosing Breckenridge a lot to add variety and get the most out of my season pass.

But here we are, it’s March 2001, and I’ve only visited Breckenridge twice this season. In comparison, I’ve been to Vail eight times, Keystone seven times, and Arapahoe Basin six times.

Even getting me to Breckenridge that second time was like pulling teeth. The only reason I went is everyone else in my ski group outvoted me.

Why I hate Breckenridge

As I stated at the beginning of my article, Breckenridge is the most popular ski resort in the United States. It is also the most crowded ski resort in the United States. Okay, I don’t have exact proof of that, but take my word for it.

My idea of skiing involves my having a good time. My idea of a good time is to get in more than five or six runs the entire day.

At Breckenridge, my experience is that getting in more than a few runs just isn’t possible. Typically, I find that I’m waiting in line for twenty or thirty minutes at a time just to get back up on the lift.

You’d assume that with 25 lifts and all 25 of those lifts in operation (many ski areas do not run all their lifts all season long), they could move people. But alas, they don’t. They don’t have the infrastructure to keep up with the crowds. Breckenridge even uses the 6-chair lift system that is supposed to move as many people as possible in the fastest amount of time.

You’d assume that with 100% of their 2043 acres open for skiing, that there would be room to ski. Well, there isn’t unless you take yourself to the hardest of the expert trails. The Green and Blue runs are wall-to-wall skiers and snowboarders.

This presents another problem, aside from being slow. The kind of overcrowding is just plain dangerous to everyone on the mountain. With that many people on the same trail at the same time, it only takes one inconsiderate idiot or one inexperienced and out-of-control skier/snowboarder to cause multiple injuries. Skiing at Breckenridge a lot of times is like driving down the Interstate during rush hour. Too many people wanting to ski faster, too many people cutting each other off, too many people who are unfamiliar with the sport causing even more of a jam, too many people stopping suddenly to avoid someone who cut them off all contribute to ski accidents. It’s a recipe for disaster in my opinion, and I’m stunned that there aren’t more injuries than there are at Breckenridge.

You’d assume at $52.00 for a lift ticket purchased at the ticket office that it would keep all but the rich away. Well, you have to actually look at that figure a bit differently.

First of all, it costs about $52.00 to ski at Keystone, Arapahoe Basin, Copper Mountain, Winter Park and yes, Breckenridge. Vail and Beaver Creek cost about $59.00 if you purchase your ticket at the ticket office.

But those prices don’t even matter. Why? Because most Front Range skiers (those of us who live in Denver, Ft. Collins, Boulder, Colorado Springs, etc.) don’t ever pay full price for a lift ticket. We purchase discount lift tickets at the grocery store, so in reality we only pay about $35 or $37 for a lift ticket.

And guests who pay for lodging in the immediate area also do not pay full price for a lift ticket. Many times, lodging accommodations will either provide free lift tickets or discounted lift tickets.

On top of that, you have people like me who have a season pass, and we don’t pay anything at all. We pre-paid for our lift tickets back in April of 2000.

The people do swarm to Breckenridge because lodging isn’t as expensive as Vail, it is about 45 minutes closer to Denver, and there is a great little shopping village in the city of Breckenridge itself somewhat close to the ski area. It is, in all means, a family resort.

Copper Mountain and Keystone have their own little villages, but I have to admit they’re not as quaint as Breckenridge. Arapahoe Basin is a bare-bones type of facility. People drive there to ski, and even though it is a mere ten minutes from Keystone, it doesn’t have a village or anything of that nature to provide amenities to skiers aside from the one lodge/cafeteria at the base of the mountain.

Why I think the staff at Breckenridge hates Breckenridge

The first time I skied at Breckenridge this season, I went with my sister. She wanted to go to Breckenridge and I wanted her to have a good time so I conceded. She is very much a beginner skier. I figured that if we went mid-week, the crowds wouldn’t be so awful. It wasn’t Winter Break, it wasn’t Spring Break, and it wasn’t a holiday. This was your average normal workweek Wednesday.

My first experience with Breckenridge personnel was at the ticket window. While I had a season pass, my sister didn’t. I can, with my season pass purchase deep-discount “buddy” passes. I found the lady at the ticket window a bit on the rude side, especially when I asked where the lockers were. She almost snarled at me and treated me like I was a stupid person for asking directions.

I thought one of the reasons women hated men because they refuse to ask directions. But, I digress…

When I ski at Vail, Keystone, Copper, Winter Park, Arapahoe Basin, Ski Cooper or Eldora, the lift operators are usually very friendly and chatty. If you ask a lift operator where they’re from, they’ll usually give you a cheery smile and tell you. If you’re wearing something unusual, you’re almost guaranteed a friendly comment about how “cool” your outfit is.

At Breckenridge, I found that some (not all) of the lift operators seemed like my just being there was a bother to them. No one wanted to answer any questions; no one wanted to pass a few minutes chatting. They gave the impression that the customer (me) was interfering with their ability to operate the machinery.

But the worst was yet to come.

My sister and I had our third real run of the day. We had just come off the Beaver Run Super Chair, and we were skiing the Briar Rose run, which is a very simple Blue trail on Peak 9. Immediately to the east of the Briar Rose run is a very short Black trail called Sizzler. At the bottom of Sizzler, there is a cut-off back to the Briar Rose run.

I instructed my sister to keep skiing and to meet me at the bottom of Sizzler where the two trails merged. She seemed to indicate she understood where we were to meet, but nonetheless when I got to the area where we were supposed to meet, she was nowhere to be found.

I waited around in that area for five minutes then skied to the bottom of the Mercury Super Chair and waited there for fifteen minutes. I then asked the lift operator if he could please put a message on the message board asking her to stay at the bottom of the particular lift.

The lift operator told me that putting that kind of message was against procedure and that I would have to go to the ski patrol office located at the bottom of the Beaver Run Super Chair. I reluctantly skied to the ski patrol office and explained my problem.

They indicated that they couldn’t do anything for me unless my sister was hurt. I explained that all I wanted to do was leave a message on the message board of the Mercury Super Chair lift, and they said I would have to go back to that lift and speak to the lift operator!

Instead, I went to the lift operator at the Beaver Run Super Chair and she was nice enough to call up to the Mercury Super Chair and asked to leave a message telling my sister that I would be at the ticket office. Half an hour later, my sister showed up and we were able to get together again.

My honest opinion is that the staff at Breckenridge in general just doesn’t like having to deal with the immense crowds and that their staff probably isn’t properly trained in Customer Service skills and is instead trained in how to run the lift, how to administer First Aid, etc. For a resort that is supposed to be the most popular resort in the United States, one would think you would receive great customer service.

Then again, there are times where the American public really seems to enjoy being treated like scum. Maybe these are the same people who are visiting Breckenridge?

What I like about Breckenridge

I can’t say that I hate everything about Breckenridge. The terrain at Breckenridge is very nice. If it were less crowded, I could probably enjoy it. It offers very easy runs (Sawmill, Four O’Clock) and some of the toughest runs (anything in the Peak 7 Bowl) in Summit County.

Even when I head to Peak 10, where there is no beginner terrain, there seem to be very large crowds. On these expert trails, the crowds become even more of a hazard because you have to pay more attention to the terrain right in front of you, and it becomes difficult to watch others and the trail at the same time. The intermediate trails don’t pose the same kind of problems, but they are even more crowded than the expert trails.

Breckenridge does offer gorgeous views of the Continental Divide and other mountains in the area. The views are better at Arapahoe Basin, but that’s only because you’re on the Continental Divide there.

Breckenridge offers more free parking than any other resort I can think of. The only other resort that comes close is perhaps Copper Mountain’s brand-new parking lot. You can come in late and still find free parking at Breckenridge.

Statistics for Breckenridge

It would be remiss of me to not cite the statistics of the Breckenridge Ski area. This comes directly from one of their trail maps:

Hours of Operation: 8:30am to 4:00pm
Base Elevation: 9600 feet
Summit Elevation: 12,988 feet
Vertical Rise: 3398 feet
Lifts: 25 total
Lift Capacity: 32,480 people per hour
Total Terrain: 2043 acres
Bowls: 722 acres
Snowmaking: 516 acres
Trail Classifications: 15% easiest, 28% more difficult, 22% most difficult, 35% expert

Conclusion and Recommendation

For my own selfish reasons, I recommend that when you ski in Summit County or Eagle County, that you choose Breckenridge. Tell all of your friends to only choose Breckenridge. Breckenridge is the best ski area in the United States – no, make that the world!

But, if you’re looking for my own personal recommendation, it’ll be a very long time before I show my face at Breckenridge anymore. While it’s nice to have another mountain to ski for free, I will take a pass on the crowds. I will take a pass on being treated like a pain in the butt to the staff by them.

While skiing is inherently a dangerous sport, I think I’ll pass on the added danger that those excessive crowds offer.

When I visit a ski area, I come to ski. At Breckenridge, I wait in line.

Thanks, but no thanks.


Recommended: No

Level of Experience Needed: All
Best Time to Visit: Never
Best Suited For: Families