Tag: lift ticket

“Not worth the lift ticket prices”

Rude personnel, extremely strict rules… inconsistent feedback from people working here regarding the resort rules.

Not worth the lift ticket prices and f**k vail resorts altogether

This place is an absolute nightmare! Do not come here unless you want to wait in line for a shuttle for over an hour minimum and wait to park your car for an hour as well. Just parking your car will make you wanna leave it’s so chaotic. Have fun looking at the backside when you arrive, there’s fresh powder everywhere, however they won’t open it and force feed everyone into lines once you hit the front side. It’s honestly the worst resort I’ve ever been to. Just a giant trap to take your money away from you. Oh and when it’s time to leave be prepared to wait in another hour line to get back to your car and then another hour to leave. Avoid at all costs

2 hours to download from village to parking lot. 100+ people line built up from 3:30 to 4 waiting on first bus. Supply trucks were dangerously pulling in and out through the queue of people. Cutting left and right with no direction. Total mess.

No lights in the pitch black parking lot at 6 pm to top it off. This resort needs a total overhaul on customer service and parking functionality. Frankly unacceptable from an upper level management perspective. They have the $$ to do it right.

Don’t come here unless you stay on site. 4x Epic Pass holder. Heavenly and Kirkwood are visitor friendly.

After paying for very EXPENSIVE ticket during Christmas, we were informed by staff that the mountain is closed for the day due to safety reason and extreme weather, after only less than 2 hours of total time spent at the resort. When asking about partial refund or credit, nothing was offered and staff told us that “this situation happens frequently at the resort”.

Source: Google reviews

“We need a skier’s Bill of Rights!”

We went up to Northstar for 4 days and could only ski for 1 day. 2 Of the 4 was simple conditions and being shut down for good reason (rain and unexpected amounts of snow). However, on the 4th day: New Years Day, the day AFTER 36 inches of fresh powder had been dumped on the mountain, we arrived early (lifts were to open at 9:am). We parked, we arrived at the Gondola, only to be informed that the Express Lift is Closed and would likely not open and then we were instructed to get on the gondola line, which was so long that it weaved down and around and back up to where we just were.

We have had the same problem with Northstar before: they are under staffed and this morning, the excuse was “our people can’t get here”. We need a skier’s Bill of Rights! They charge big money for blackout day tickets so that you can expect to get on the mountain during peak days. However, and once again, we felt like the customer doesn’t matter and the Vale group doesn’t take their responsibility seriously to get people on the mountain! That’s the business they are in!

I sat out two days waiting for this day and fought off the family who wanted to to go home rather than sit around saying “these will be the best conditions ever”.  So why doesn’t the lifts open on the best day of skiing? I talked to a manager and said this: I said “You do realize that thousands of people have spent hundreds of dollars per person per day to enjoy skiing here today. It is Northstar’s business to provide safe and timely access to this beautiful day of perfect ski conditions. Do you realize that that’s the business you are in? The manager said – Do you know why we aren’t open? I said, because of lack of staff which happens here virtually all the time- he replied no, we have plenty of people, they just can’t get here. I said, with the money you are charging and all the costs for people to get here, you should have places for people to STAY HERE AND OPEN UP. He said- wait for it – ” We don’t have the resources to do that.” I said “I am done. We waited, got here, and now we are going to wait for two hours to wait for the gondola line to start which will be 2 hours minimum (that’s what they told us!) We
Are out of here. This resort sucks. Our friends arrived in Palisades and jumped on the slopes. What a waste of time and money.

Sean B. via Yelp

“Vail can’t hire competent managers to run the resorts”

Vail can’t hire competent managers to run the resorts and don’t care enough about front line employees. Profits over people all day everyday.

Joe Zimmerman via Facebook

Vail has to be one of the worst run companies I’ve ever seen. They pay their employees far less than competitors, and then blame anyone but themselves when they don’t have enough workers to operate the mountains that all of us paid thousands of dollars for passes on. They don’t care, they already have everyone’s money. I know Stevens Pass in Washington, at some point only 1 of the chairlifts was being operated by the lifts department, the rest were being run by other departments like rentals and ski school, simply because they couldn’t find enough suckers to work for their pitiful wages. I’ve heard from instructor friends that they went from 6 people per instructor, to an unlimited number of people per instructor, and my friend had 17 kids in her class. I can walk from my condo to the gondola in Vail, and next year I plan on driving to Copper Mountain and getting an Ikon pass instead. Vail Mountain is great, but the company that runs it can’t go bankrupt soon enough. Maybe then someone else will step in and actually run things the way they used to be.

Tommy Newnes via Facebook

I’m trying to find a way to make a official post to bring attention to what Vail Resorts is doing. OBVIOUSLY the WORST lines, services in many years. SO, since Vail is going to keep taking everyone’s money and NOT HAVE ENOUGH employees there is a solution. Our Government has a program which allows immigrants to come into the United States of America. It is a Visa called H2-A which allows U.S. Employers to bring in as many as they want. The H2-A visa is based on mainly ONE FACT. That is that there are NOT ENOUGH citizens of the United States to do the SEASONAL WORK which QUALIFIES the Employer as well as the immigrants. This Visa program I mainly designed for farmers and landscape companies during the season. What do you think?? I personally think that I myself would rather stay in a WARMER CLIMATE. If you like what I said please post it out there. And please check out the Government program H2-A Visa. It is VERY CLEAR. GOOD LUCK. and by the way SHAME ON VAIL ASSOCIATES for trying to be the WALMARTS of the SKI INDUSTRY. They are ruining it for EVERYONE

Peter Wolff via Facebook.com

Worst ski experience ever. If you like waiting in long lines for lifts and dining come on down. 30 minute lift lines and they continue to sell ski passes at the base. Lots of snow but 30% of mountain open making congestion all the worse. After buying 5 epic passes per year for 10+ years I am done. Ikon or mountain collective here we come.

Leonard Feiner via Facebook.com

“Horrible experience with Epic Pass”

Horrible experience with Epic Pass that ruined our vacation plan and we left Tahoe without any skiing.
The pass office refused to give me the pass we bought online because it was suspended for an accident last year (I was badly hit by someone from behind and I had zero fault in that accident). There was no warning when I payed for the pass or in my account page. They kicked me back and forth around ~5 different offices. From 9am to 1pm I made 20+ phone calls on the mountain and walked to different offices in my ski boots. On my way leaving the resort around 1 pm, they called to tell me the suspension was finally resolved and asked me to wait for another hour and try again at the pass office.
They suspended my pass for no good reason and without any warning. All the offices have no clear idea who is in charge of the suspension, and are very impatient to help on an issue outside their duty, even when they know a customer is desperately waiting to get onto the mountain.
Two days later I received my pass in my mail that’s sent out the day we bought it online, days before the hassle on the mountain. So if it’s OK for them to send me the pass by mail, why on earth can they refuse giving it to me at the resort??

Chenyun Wu

“Wasted 3 hours waiting in line to get our pass”

Wasted 3 hours waiting in line to get our pass that we ordered online ahead of time, closes at 4 so by the time we got to the slops the whole day was gone. DONT go

Carolyn Davidson

“Be willing to wait on just about everything”

Be willing to wait on just about everything from lifts to rentals if needed. If you plan on stopping by the day of without reservations in advance, you can expect 3 plus hour wait for gear rentals. Average wait time for main lifts is around 10-30 min. Also have a photo of or your actual vaccination card on hand to be able to enjoy any food from northstar themselves.
Biggest issue, if you plan on using the free parking lots expect an hour wait at times just to get to and from the ski area. Just didn’t have a good time but maybe you will.

Matthew Jeff

Single-Day Lift Ticket on Vail Mountain Hits $1,566

Skiers arriving at Vail’s namesake Colorado resort over the weekend were shocked to find four-digit prices greeting them at the ticket window. Adult one-day lift tickets were listed at $1,566, a nearly 700 percent increase over the previous peak price of $229. A child’s one-day lift ticket rose to $798.

“This is an outrage,” said Abner Stevens, 92, a retired mining engineer who was walking back to the car with his wife and six grandchildren. “Why I remember when you could barter a little squirrel meat and a shotgun shell for a ride on the chairlift. Now these damn kids will just waste the whole day Faceposting on their Nintendos.”

Full story at: StormSkiing