36″ fresh snow and they tweet the mountain is 100% open. On arrival, nothing could be further from the truth. One gondola open to access the mountain and a two hour wait. Only two lifts open at mid.mountain. Meanwhile, exasperated punters filling the Vail Resorts coffers buying food and drink in the village while they wait. Cynical BS by Northstar/Vail. Cash cow in the short term, but these people will not return & they will tell others. Terrible experience.
OP via Google reviews
Tag: lift
Vail Resorts Stamping Out on Those Leaving Their Equipment to Reserve Place in Line at Heavenly Mountain, CA
The reader who shared the picture says that “…people are placing their ski or snowboard equipment up in the front of the lift line in the morning, then go hang out in their warm cars until about ten minutes before loading the lift.”
Source: https://snowbrains.com
“Another scary Vail resorts accident”
..just witnessed the chair directly in front of us fall off the haul rope during a wind hold on the peak 8 superconnect at Breckenridge’s Peak 8 SuperConnect. The chair was close to the top terminal and fell about 20 feet. ski patrol was already there and the guy riding the chair is ok.
brettmgoldberg1 via Twitter
The lift involved was built by Leitner-Poma in 2002 and connects Peaks 8 and 9 with three stations. There are normally 190 chairs on the line.
..
This is the second carrier to fall from a detachable lift in North America this season. Earlier this month, an empty gondola fell from Mont-Sainte-Anne’s gondola, an incident blamed on human error after a grip attach fault. Last season, an occupied gondola cabin fell from the Sunday River Chondola in high winds. Prior to that, a chair detachment at Camelback, Pennsylvania injured three people in March 2021.
Liftblo
“Vail will collapse. It’s not IF but WHEN.”
Vail will collapse. It’s not if but when. When pass prices go up by 20% they can only muster a 6% revenue increase associated with a 12% drop in units sold their upper tier passes while buying FOUR new areas. This all in an economy with huge inflation and huge labor cost increases. The financials just don’t add up to sustainability.
Their Experience Of A Lifetime (TM) is turning people away. Limited snowmaking this year (disasterous last year).
…
Poor grooming quality. I laugh at some of the pics posted to the pass group on Facebook talking about the amazing conditions when there’s huge grooming ruts, 2 foot ice boulders, death cookies galore, etc. in the pics.
Lack of maintenance to their lifts leading them to break down all the time (Attitash last year, Stowe this year). Lack of running lifts. Non lifties running lifts. Grumpy employees some that scream at you for no reason. Bad traffic. Long lines. Charge you to park with no lifts running. I can go on…
Interest rates are through their roof. Their line of credit they’ve been using to fund their upgrades is now suddenly much costlier. Meanwhile their bread and butter resorts — Vail, Beaver Creek, Breckinridge, Keystone — have a ton of aging detachable that need to be replaced within the decade.
obienick via Snowjournal
5 things to know before you go to Northstar ski resort
- Low elevation results in warmer and icier conditions, so even though they groom a lot, there are often patches of ice that catch you. It can be really bad, which is why we gave it a relatively low rating of 3 after this happened to us multiple times.
- Limited vertical
- Northstar is the most popular Tahoe resort for hordes of Bay Area weekend skiers, so crowds are always an issue when conditions are good.
- The parking lot situation is bad because the close-in lots fill up fast and then you have to park in the lots out by highway 267 and take a fairly long bus ride into the village.
- Even if you get the closer-in parking, it’s a long walk through the village until you get to the gondola, which you still have to take before getting to the real skiing terrain. It’s a long process.
Source: skinorthamerica100.com
“Worst resort I’ve been to”
Worst resort I’ve been to (and I have been to a good number Europe and North America)
Chimpsey Powers via Google reviews
Arrived at 830 to parking lot (furthest one as uppers were already full ) and didn’t actually ski until 1045. Line to park. Line to bus. Bus had line of traffic to reach resort. Long walk to gondola. Long line for gondola. Line for next lift (and lift after) as zephyr was spinning but closed … fortunately being on epic .. meant didn’t need wait lift ticket line also and drop what ever ridiculous sum of money for day pass only to stand around waiting. I don’t believe I’ve ever waited so much except at Disney as young kid. Every ski area I’ve been to: arriving at 830 means downhill action by 915 at latest.
In short: terrible logistics and designed resort. Not going to pay to stand around. And even when skiing : I’ve had more fun at east coast 1000 ft verticals ski areas.
First time and last visit. And after reading lots of other reviews: seems many others feel the same. Assuming the good reviews are from beginning skiers or paid resort fanboys/moms
“I’m confused by this place”
I’m confused by this place. Everything is so nice at surface but the bed literally fell apart at bed time and it was too late to get help. Concierge tried to replace us but not able to. Didn’t wanna bother manager at midnight. Were told we’d be taken care of after the fact. Still waiting. Someone knocked two different times in the morning despite us getting late check out. I also think the pool/hot tub closes too early. They could stay open at least until 10 but it’s 9. Pool table is sadly over worn. Didn’t get a chance to play ping pong before it closed. One of the hot tubs was closed when we got to it but front desk didn’t tell us in advance. Kind of a mixed bag.
Danika Sonsa via Google reviews
“Totally wasted my time for no reason”
My condo didn’t have a working stove, oven, microwave, garbage disposal, or dishwasher. I have been trying to contact the manager for a week and they are avoiding me and offer zero compensation. These condos are a huge rip off and they are totally inflexible about check ins. They make you wait for an email at exactly 4pm and front desk does nothing. I had my 6 month old and 2 year old and just had to sit in the parking lot for an hour while my room was clearly ready. Totally wasted my time for no reason.
Nicholas Young via Google reviews
“It is suppose to be quality and is not”
What to say… it is suppose to be quality and is not. it is very expensive (i’m used to it so that is not the point) . The chalet itself is beautiful and same for the landscape. Service is horrible! The don’t know how to handle it keep forgetting and making mistakes. Food is just average. Wine list is …we are out of this and our of tnat. Don’t try to go in the pool is to small and over crowded…and they really don’t care…the anser is seat there and queue… the lake club is an highlight…besides the absurd daily rate and stupid closing hour at 4 pm…best sunset time. So…sorry man this is a joke place wont see me ever again.
Alvise Fontana Z via Google reviews
“Bait and switch”
This is my first ever review, i believe. I made a reservation with American Express to stay at Northstar California Resort. I needed to make a change / extend my time of our stay to our reservation and so I called the resort directly, they couldn’t make the change, I had to do it with American Express, which is fine. But in this conversation they stated “do you know we do not have air conditioning”? This is something that American Express and Northstar failed to mention in their advertising of the room/property. Seems a bit Bait and switch…so i get to find this out when I arrive with my 85 year old mother and my husband who has major allergies, I contact American Express to cancel, which they stated it was a no cancellation policy for this resort. Which was fine until they omitted very important information about their resort and the room. American Express called the resort on my behalf and spoke to the Manager, which stated to them they should “Open a Window”. And will not refund my money.
Amber D via Google reviews
I will write a review everywhere I can and write a letter to everyone in their management I can, And NO i have never written a negative review. This a true and accurate review .
“Thank you for ruining our trip”
Paid over 2k for a weekend time with 2 kids and got kicked out of every single place to sled. Apparently people with kids are not welcome there. Thank you for ruining our trip and breaking hearts of my 2 kids.
Rumaysa Noman via Google reviews
Source: Google reviews
$200 ticket gives you nothing
Capacity control is a joke. Terrible logistics. 1 hour traffic jam, 3 hours waiting for rental gear, 40 min wait for lift and you’re stuck on it for another hour cause some random issues. Count how much you get for your $200 ticket
Eric P (via Google reviews)
“What a massive waste of time”
It’s 12:20pm and we’ve been in so many lines that we haven’t been on a single run yet. What a massive waste of time.
Oh, and their lift tickets are more expensive than Squaw’s. Why?
Quit peddling waffles and focus your investments on building new lifts and logistical infrastructure.
This place just isn’t what it used to be in the 90s
Kevin H. (via Yelp)
Northstar is not family friendly
My family are season passholders while I’m a non skier. When they ski I normally sit in the lodge. Not at Northstar. They are now charging $40 for me to get on a gondola and ride to the lodge (because I get a ride) or the other option is taking a gondola up to the Ritz where I can’t stay because I don’t have a room. There is no other ski resort that charges for a non skier to sit in the lodge. They have lost our families business as we will not be returning to ski or do anything else at Northstar!
Mandi M. (via Yelp)
“20-30 minute waits on every single lift”
On sSunday there were 20-30 minute waits on every single lift. completely packed with people. limited occupancy is absolutely a lie. i get it, you need to have people buy food to get a beer. to charge be $15 for the cheapest entree (tiny bowl of chili) and another $14 for a beer i feel is just disrespectful. at sierra they have $2 hot dogs which is totally fair. and, on top of all that the snow quality was absolute garbage. which is kind of out of their control. but they do advertise that their snow base is 18″-35″ which from what i can see is also a lie. there’s exposed dirt on almost every run when i was there and exposed rocks all over the place.
so if you’re going to take something away from this.. byob. screw their rules. i would also suggest not even going. at least until it snows again. definitely not worth the full price of a lift ticket.
Darrick F. (via Yelp)
NorthStar California Sucks | VailEpicFail 