Boot Up Areas: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (Don't Forget the Nonexistent)

[Sibhusky]

Not sure where I said it was hard or slow. It tears up your boot soles if you don't wear protective things like CatTrax. I've even started planning the walk from snow back to locker room to maximize walking on carpet instead of concrete because I keep my boots for 400+ days.

 

[crgildart]

Not sure where I said it was hard or slow. It tears up your boot soles if you don't wear protective things like CatTrax. I've even started planning the walk from snow back to locker room to maximize walking on carpet instead of concrete because I keep my boots for 400+ days.

You'll also bust your ass walking around in ski boots without proper sole protection, especially inside where snow has melted and floors are wet.

 

[James]

Wear them on the train. Chamonix valley.

These guys were going off piste, but Cham is full of clompers trashing their boots all over town, on the buses, trains. Most Texas Suitcases I’ve seen in one day - Cham.
I’ve walked over a mile in boots/cat tracks to the lift in Chamonix. At least it was flat.

The areas aren’t great for booting up, but you can usually find a locker to rent.

 

[raisingarizona]

I’ve never had any issues with booting up at my car. It’s easy and them I’m ready to go. My boots do get beat up but I still make em last for 3+ seasons. Changing anywhere else sounds like an unnecessary hassle.

 

[raisingarizona]

The "extra stuff" is just your boots and you get to put them on warm, which means you'll be warmer all day. Plus you won't be trashing your boot soles. I did the CatTrax routine for a couple decades. Would much rather be warm while I put my boots on.

But my car is warm and so are my boots that have been sitting under the heater. The lodge gets kind of too warm when I’m in all of my ski gear.

Walking in my boots has been a part of skiing for me as much as actually skiing for 25 years now since I started skiing back country so I don’t understand this thread very well. It’s not like I’ve ever felt that I walk that much from parking to the lift.

 

[clong83]

I’ve never had any issues with booting up at my car. It’s easy and them I’m ready to go. My boots do get beat up but I still make em last for 3+ seasons. Changing anywhere else sounds like an unnecessary hassle.

This. And soles are often replaceable these days. Because I love my current boots a whole lot, I bought a spare sole kit for when/if the time comes. But 4 years in at 30+ days a year and they still look fine. Ski shop guys agree, which is good enough for me. Unless you are walking a mile each way on open concrete, (or get unlucky and just scrape them up real bad on something) I just don't see the wear being an enormous issue. Walking across a parking lot 100 times shouldn't take off enough material to make your boots dangerously worn. I walk across worse sometimes when I am bootpacking through a rocky stretch in the early season.

 

[Tony S]

Ha, maybe that's it then. I and all of my ski buddies are well over 30, but none of us are easterners. I've never really been out east.

Weather. And parking lot surface. (Hockey rink and/or mud wrestling arena.) Also weather. Plus the weather thing. We have it here. Freezing rain is a staple, for example.

 

[crgildart]

View attachment 77908
Wear them on the train. Chamonix valley.

These guys were going off piste, but Cham is full of clompers trashing their boots all over town, on the buses, trains. Most Texas Suitcases I’ve seen in one day - Cham.
I’ve walked over a mile in boots/cat tracks to the lift in Chamonix. At least it was flat.

The areas aren’t great for booting up, but you can usually find a locker to rent.

What about on the helicopter??

 

[Guy in Shorts]

Only time I boot up at the car/outside these days is spring time at Killington when I'm tailgating with our friends and don't even go in the lodge.

Us too only problem is that we tailgate October until June that means booting up less than 50 steps from the snow. Most days I just pull out my folding chair and slip my boots on. Many other days we just hop on the ski bus to boot and bake. Skiing back to my tailgate never gets old.

 

[surfsnowgirl]

Us too only problem is that we tailgate October until June that means booting up less than 50 steps from the snow. Most days I just pull out my folding chair and slip my boots on. Many other days we just hop on the ski bus to boot and bake. Skiing back to my tailgate never gets old.

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First world problems right Not the 802 bus ha ha. You guys are definitely hard core doing that all season especially in the bitter cold months. I am pretty hard core but I think to do that in January I'd need a portable heater at my feet.

Booting up in the parking lot is definitely much easier with the camping chairs we keep in the car.

See you in October.

 

[James]

honestly find that carrying my boots and skis/poles is much more difficult than just wearing the boots and only carrying the skis/poles. But I never found walking in ski boots all that hard. I usually walk faster in my ski boots than a lot of winded tourists do in their street shoes through the parking lot. Maybe it's just my gait.

It’s what you get used to. Race kids always have two pairs skis, a back pack with boots in it. They walk to the lodge.Then at some age some start carrying 4 pairs of heavy skis. That's really heavy.

The Irony of all this is dirt bag areas will often have much better areas to boot up then the expensive resorts. Eg Jackson Hole.

What about on the helicopter??

You should have your boots on before entering it. Unless you're flying it.

 

[Marker]

Us too only problem is that we tailgate October until June that means booting up less than 50 steps from the snow. Most days I just pull out my folding chair and slip my boots on. Many other days we just hop on the ski bus to boot and bake. Skiing back to my tailgate never gets old.

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We ride the shuttle bus after booting up at the condo. Just saying...

 

[Sibhusky]

Walking across a parking lot 100 times shouldn't take off enough material to make your boots dangerously worn.

That's fifty days. Less than a season.

This pair of boots has 417 days so far. They are still snug -- I had thought they might be due for replacement this coming season, but as the last season ended I felt they were still fine. The last pair of boots had 462. Now you're talking over 900 trips.

I am probably an outlier on boot replacement.

 

[crgildart]

You should have your boots on before entering it. Unless you're flying it.

I'm talking a private chopper, just me and the guide, not a group..

 

[Wilhelmson]

It’s what you get used to.

Yes. When our kids were 5 and 7 booting up at the car in 10 degrees wasn't a good option. We even found that having them boot up at the lodge was faster than booting up in a condo or hotel. Also for efficiency it is useful to have a repeatable routine. If I'm alone I prefer the car.

 

[mdf]

I rarely boot up at the car. Over the years there have been periods when I tried it. I found its acceptability depended on a few variables:
- what the weather is doing
- what the ground surface is like (puddles, mud, gravel? solid and dry? packed snow?)
- is there something to sit on? Like a rear hatch without much of a lip. I find trying to boot up sitting sideways in a seat is horrible: the door doesn't open far enough (especially if there is another car next to you), the seat is trying to make you slid too far into it, etc.
- how many people you have. If the good sitting/leaning spots on the car are fewer than your passengers, you have to take turns and wait.

Nowadays I would only do it in special circumstances, such as it being a long uphill to the lodge and downhill to a lift (and already having a ticket).

One other thing that may affect how people feel about booting up in the car -- whether they need to go inside anyway, for example to buy a ticket, use the bathroom, meet people, or wait for the lifts to open.

 

[crgildart]

^^^ I've got a tall stepstool I use to reach the ski box and carpet mat.. Sit on the step stool with the carpet under my feet. Kids prefer the rear bumper/hatch to sit on.

 

[UGASkiDawg]

Drive car to hill. Grab skis and boot bag and walk to whatever suffices for a base area. Find somewhere to sit and put boots on. Find a place to cram bag (which has occasionally been at the top of the lift next to a tree). Go skiing.

Bunch of over thinkers around here

 

[Bill Miles]

Boot up at car, boots warm enough from car heater, shuttle bus to dropoff, about 100 yards or so walk to lodge/lifts, replace boot heel and toe pieces every two or three years. Can usually park next to snow on Warm Springs side, but it is an extra 15 minute drive so only do this in late spring when River Run base closes.

At some other mountains, get there early enough to minimize walking (Gad lot at Snowbird, Mill lot at Mammoth, etc)

 

[dbostedo]

One other thing that may affect how people feel about booting up in the car -- whether they need to go inside anyway, for example to buy a ticket, use the bathroom, meet people, or wait for the lifts to open.

Specific to my "home mountain" (as close as I have to one anyway - Whitetail):

-- The walk from the parking lot is probably 150 yards and includes a flight of stairs, and sometimes some ice
-- To get on snow you walk right past the cafeteria/boot up area
-- I have to stop and buy a lift ticket too

So I generally walk up to the lodge, drop my skis off, buy my lift ticket, step into the cafeteria and boot up, then step back outside and grab my skis and walk the 50 or 100 feet to the lift. Futzing around at my car to get my boots on, then still carrying my skis and buying my lift ticket, etc. in my boots seems like a pain.

The only problem with booting up indoors, is having to wear my boot backpack to the lodge. The only problems with booting up at the car is the inconvenience of not having a good warm place to sit and boot up (and put my neoprene knee braces on), and having to walk around and stand in line in my boots. I MUCH prefer to just wear my backpack.

Apologies to @UGASkiDawg, because I am very clearly overthinking things now.