How far away from a ski resort would you be willing to live?

[Uncle-A]

At this time I am 1.5 hours from Blue Mt. or Camelback and 2.5 from Hunter. But I am moving to a new home that would add about 30 - 45 minutes to those commutes. That is if the sale of my old home goes through in January.

 

[newfydog]

The thread is how far away would you be willing to live. That is a question which involves some real planning, short term and long term, and probably changes through time..

I attended three colleges--all with skiing nearby. Other schools were not considered. Hey, there's lots of options, might as well ski.

I lived in Colorado for 10 years, in the mountains above Denver, commuting to the city all week and out to the ski areas every weekend. I had friends in Colorado who refused to consider a front range job---to far from the skiing. Some did well, some consigned themselves to "poverty with a view".

It was a good compromise for my younger years. I had friends who accepted transfers from Denver to places like Houston, I never considered any of those options. They would say they were doing it for their kids, but personally, I would have preferred to be a kid from a modest income family near skiing than a richer kid in elsewhere. We didn't have any kids, so we didn't worry so much about our jobs anyway and refused to leave Colorado.

I finally came off my high standards in a big way, with a view to the long term and moved to Jakarta, Indonesia, sea level and darn near right on the equator., and over 3,000 miles from any skiing. Actually it was a pretty interesting place to be, and we could save in a month what we used to save in a year. When we got to where we could form our own company, we based it in Singapore. Lousy skiing there as well.

However, that let us retire embarrassingly early. For many years since, we've never been more than 22 miles from the lifts, and we get to ski mid-week. It is a good distance for us, because all the snow is up the road, and we can bike, paddle and fish down here rather than shovelling the stuff.

 

[sortsol]

I guess as I re-read the question, In order for me to make skiing a day trip, anything over an hour and a half drive each way regularly would be pushing it for me. If it was over 90 minutes, I probably wouldn't buy a season pass. I wouldn't go up as often. I'm really impressed with all of you who drive 2+ hours each way regularly just for day trips.

Now, that doesn't mean I won't travel to ski. It just doesn't happen often.This year for example, I'm hoping to make it up to Jackson Hole once to ski.

 

[wyowindrunner]

Have lived 10 minutes from a local Wyo hill 600" vert, 20 minutes from a great mountain in Montana with iffy snow coverage some years, 45 minutes from Park City, and now live 70 miles from the most consistant snow in the U.S., with a local 1000' vert hill 15-20 miutes away for those 2-3 hour afternoon excursions when obligations of the day take up more time than an hour and ten minute trip allows (plus they have night skiing, can see the lights from the house). One of the requirements when we bought in this area was to be no more than an hour from a major ski area- and five years ago the price/value ratio here was outstanding. Lived in Texas- Houston for a while-great job but couldn't take it-had a severe case of mountain withdrawal. An hour, plus or minus , is it anymore. Very fortunate to have the luxury of living anywhere I want / can afford with my work schedule.

 

[Joe Strummer]

I use to be 15 mins from Cypress Bowl and 90 mins from Whistler. 90 mins was just too much of a slog. Now I live 30 mins from Whistler and 45 mins from Vancouver. Just perfect. I can ski Whistler whenever I want without shelling out for Whistler real estate.

 

[Monique]

Your body will adjust to the altitude regardless of age. If that's why you're not sleeping properly it will resolve itself. If there's other reasons then the location won't matter...

I have no problem sleeping at sea level and sleep fairly well at 7600 ft. At >9 k ft in elevation, that is another story.

@David @TexasStout it depends - I have a condo in Breck, so 9600'. Live in the front range, so ~5200'. The first night, I always toss and turn ... unless I supplement with a tiny bite of an edible 1.5 hours before bedtime. That will usually do it. However, when I was spending 4-5 days a week in Breck, my body did adapt. There are also altitude supplements that I think have been helpful, although it might be Placebo effect. I think Ginko is usually the key ingredient.

FWIW, my dogs seem to have a similar experience - they sleep much better if they are in the mountains more. I know, because if they're restless, they wake me up!

I also find that arrival makes a difference. If I can get to the condo by 8pm, I can settle in a little and am not stressed about taking the dogs for a walk. If it's 10pm, well, I am already guaranteed insufficient sleep (for me), and I still have to walk the dogs ...

I guess the main advice I can give someone considering a ski condo is - don't have dogs. They make everything more complicated.



As for the original question, hmm. A few people have pointed out the difference between driving up the night before vs driving the day of. For me, the latter sucks. Traffic around here amplifies it, but in general, I don't want to set my alarm any earlier than I must. I can go months in the winter where I never get to sleep in - but there's a difference in getting up at 4:30, 5, 6, etc.

Honestly, I see the question kind of in reverse. If I had to move farther away from skiing for my job, how would that impact my skiing? If I couldn't afford or chose not to pay for a condo in the mountains, how often would I ski?

Those questions have eaten up a lot of my brain power lately, because I need to make a choice by summer, when my ski condo landlords, who have been charging me a ridiculously low rent, plan to sell the condo. Do I pay through the nose for a ski condo - and if so, do I prioritize commute to one resort, or go more equidistant? Would I be okay with not having my own condo, inevitably skiing less frequently because of the dogs, but retiring sooner? (For anyone thinking I could share a condo, see "dogs." Also, hell is other people.)

Currently, my morning "commute" to ski is a 10 minute walk (not counting the drive the night before). No need to scrape the car. But if I want to ski somewhere else, I add 15-20 minutes to the drive. Doesn't sound like much, but the difference between a 4:45am vs 5am alarm (let's hope it's not that early) is substantial in my book.

I think we all adapt to the situation we have. So right now, I would say, I wouldn't want to have a nighttime commute of more than 2 hours (typical case), and I wouldn't want to have to drive more than 10-15 minutes. But who knows what I'd really tolerate? And push come to shove, maybe I'd even ski less often. (Heresy!)

 

[David]

@David @TexasStout it depends - I have a condo in Breck, so 9600'. Live in the front range, so ~5200'. The first night, I always toss and turn ... unless I supplement with a tiny bite of an edible 1.5 hours before bedtime. That will usually do it. However, when I was spending 4-5 days a week in Breck, my body did adapt. There are also altitude supplements that I think have been helpful, although it might be Placebo effect. I think Ginko is usually the key ingredient.

FWIW, my dogs seem to have a similar experience - they sleep much better if they are in the mountains more. I know, because if they're restless, they wake me up!

I also find that arrival makes a difference. If I can get to the condo by 8pm, I can settle in a little and am not stressed about taking the dogs for a walk. If it's 10pm, well, I am already guaranteed insufficient sleep (for me), and I still have to walk the dogs ...

I guess the main advice I can give someone considering a ski condo is - don't have dogs. They make everything more complicated.



As for the original question, hmm. A few people have pointed out the difference between driving up the night before vs driving the day of. For me, the latter sucks. Traffic around here amplifies it, but in general, I don't want to set my alarm any earlier than I must. I can go months in the winter where I never get to sleep in - but there's a difference in getting up at 4:30, 5, 6, etc.

Honestly, I see the question kind of in reverse. If I had to move farther away from skiing for my job, how would that impact my skiing? If I couldn't afford or chose not to pay for a condo in the mountains, how often would I ski?

Those questions have eaten up a lot of my brain power lately, because I need to make a choice by summer, when my ski condo landlords, who have been charging me a ridiculously low rent, plan to sell the condo. Do I pay through the nose for a ski condo - and if so, do I prioritize commute to one resort, or go more equidistant? Would I be okay with not having my own condo, inevitably skiing less frequently because of the dogs, but retiring sooner? (For anyone thinking I could share a condo, see "dogs." Also, hell is other people.)

Currently, my morning "commute" to ski is a 10 minute walk (not counting the drive the night before). No need to scrape the car. But if I want to ski somewhere else, I add 15-20 minutes to the drive. Doesn't sound like much, but the difference between a 4:45am vs 5am alarm (let's hope it's not that early) is substantial in my book.

I think we all adapt to the situation we have. So right now, I would say, I wouldn't want to have a nighttime commute of more than 2 hours (typical case), and I wouldn't want to have to drive more than 10-15 minutes. But who knows what I'd really tolerate? And push come to shove, maybe I'd even ski less often. (Heresy!)

I think you should buy the condo and keep the dogs. I'm up at 4 am every Saturday or I fork over another hotel fee. I need a place closer too.

 

[Monique]

I think you should buy the condo and keep the dogs. I'm up at 4 am every Saturday or I fork over another hotel fee. I need a place closer too.

Oh, there's no scenario in which I would give the dogs up. That's not an option. But they do complicate logistics and make everything more expensive. And barring something truly unforeseen, I'll be buying that condo in the spring or summer. But even with that decided, I still need to figure out where
... a few minutes of driving can make a big difference in price, and then of course there's proximity to trail heads and such. And as always, there are a lot of individual factors that don't even relate to the proximity thing. Lots to decide.

 

[lsfaki]

...I think I’d make a gondola a custom suite ⛷

 

[DanishRider]

Well - live nearly 900 miles from a descent resort - miss Massachusetts !

 

[AaronFM]

I'm less than one hour from ski areas in the western White Mountains (Cannon, Loon, Waterville, etc), and 2-2.5 hours from just about anything (sorry Sugarloaf) in northern New England. I can be at Pats Peak in 20 min if I want to make a few runs before or after work. Anything more than an hour and I'd be wanting to get my time in to balance out the drive. Here I'm fine skiing for 2x my drive time and don't feel like I've wasted a trip or anything.

In the late 90's/ early 2000's I lived in southern Mass where it was a 2-3 hour drive to even get to some of the southern NH/VT resorts. One of the main reasons I moved back north was to be closer to skiing.

 

[François Pugh]

It depends on how rich I would be and how much free time I had. Rich enough, I could live anywhere and take ski vacations. A little less rich, but still rich, live almost anywhere and hop on a 4 hour flight to ski for the week-end. Typical working man, 1 hour from local speed bump, 6 hour drive from big mountain, 6 hour flight from good big mountain resort.

 

[dean_spirito]

No more than 20 or 30 minutes.

 

[ella_g]

We went from being 2 hrs 15 mins from where my kids raced to ten mins away. I was pretty hesitant about making the switch but have to say there’s a laundry list of incredibly great, partially intangible and definitely unquantifiable, things about being very close to a ski resort if there’s any way to pull it off. Mostly skiing a lot, the fact that people who ski and particularly ski a lot are more fun than the general population, having “family time” be skiing time, having socializing be on the mountain or drinking afterwards (vs having to deal with cocktail parties or whatever) . Etc etc. It only works for us for now be my job is flexible w working from home and my husbands flexible ish about not seeing us that much and we happened to find affordable housing. We’ll have to go back to being 2 1/4 hrs away at some point but will go to great maybe troubling lengths to pull this situation off for as long as possible. My point is, we didn’t know how big of a difference being close would make. But it turns out it’s huge. Uge!

 

[river-z]

The key word in the question is willing. For my part, I am unwilling to live outside the American or Canadian West. I grew up in Michigan sledding instead skiing and playing in the waves of Lake Michigan instead of surfing, and wouldn't go back. I enjoyed living in Fort Collins CO for 5 years, and now in LA for 10 years.

I often wish I was closer than the 2 hours it takes me to get to Big Bear and the 6 hours it takes to get to Mammoth ... but I like my job and I like living 20 minutes from the ocean.

 

[TQA]

The down side of my chosen location is that I am 2 or 3 flights away and often an overnight in Miami.

The upside is I anchor my boat in places like the Tobago Cays where the temperature almost never drops below 80 f and that is the water temperature and I can buy a gallon of Clarks Court rum for $10 sometimes less.

 

[Lars Benji]

Unfortunately I live in the Netherlands, which is home to literally zero hills.
Im lucky enough to work at the steepest indoor snowpark in Europe however, so I go ski there 3 to 4 days a week, takes around 15 mins to cycle.
Definitely not the same feeling as powder, but It's the only way I can train.
When I grow up I want to be able to jump out of my home into the slopes.

 

[hespeler]

Living a few hours away makes it easy to talk yourself out of going or at least cherry picking your days as much as possible.

I was planning on skiing today but the thought of skiing Hunter or Windham in early season conditions didn't really pump me up enough. So I thought, let me give Stratton a try as I've never been. That's about 4 and a half hours for me so I would book a room for that. Then I checked my kid's basketball schedule and saw his game was at 6:00 pm which would mean getting to the hotel at about midnight. Then I looked at some of the trip reports on this site and thought better of it and alas, here I am at work today.

I'm now considering whether or not I can stretch Stratton into a day trip...

 

[MarkP]

The down side of my chosen location is that I am 2 or 3 flights away and often an overnight in Miami.

The upside is I anchor my boat in places like the Tobago Cays where the temperature almost never drops below 80 f and that is the water temperature and I can buy a gallon of Clarks Court rum for $10 sometimes less.

With a gallon of rum, you should be able to "weather" most any temperature!

 

[TQA]

With a gallon of rum, you should be able to "weather" most any temperature!

It comes in several strengths, the 'strongest ' contains 87% alcohol. The factory warns you that the airlines will not let you fly with it.

However in emergency Coleman lanterns and outboard motors will run on it.

It also is reputed to cause unwanted pregnancies at carnival time.