IKON Pass Expands With the Addition of Mt Bachelor and Windham Mountain for the 2020/2021 Season

[ARL67]

My wife has a Breedlove guitar ( from Bend Oregon ) so might now have to put Mt. Bachelor on the trip list so she can visit the factory. My guess is that visit will cost us a new guitar to ship home ! Too bad Scott / Dawgcatching is no longer in that vicinity any longer as I definitely owe him a beer ( or 3 ) for his sage advice, his great reviews, and the deals he has provided.

My wife and I have no problem driving 30 min to get to a hill. I drive 2 hours each way, usually 2x a week to get to my home hill of 650 ft vertical. When we went to Killington this season, staying in Rutland and driving 25 min was nothing.

 

[Jim McDonald]

Yeah, 30 mins? That's insignificant. I can remember six hours on the road each way to day trips at a hill w/500 vert.

 

[David Chaus]

That drive can be amazing. It’s an easy drive, Mostly a straight shot without any major turns and no steep hill climbs, but the transition between climate zones is amazing. On a blizzard day with wind in which only a few lifts were running and driving back to town with compact snow on the road with whiteout conditions near the mountain, to sunny and dry by the time you hit town, all within a 20 mile drive. I’ve never experienced that anywhere else.

 

[slowrider]

If you leave late you will wait. The Century Dr conga line.

 

[Jacques]

Good luck with Bachelor. Due to regular horrible weather with fog, rime, ice and wind, the Summit lift can rarely be opened.
If it is not, there will be no 360 skiing.
Not to mention the same with the Northwest and Outback lifts. During storm cycles only a few lifts will be open.
If you get lucky, you might have a few good days in a seven-day deal.
There is no easy way to get there without changing planes several times. Redmond airport is small.
No on mt. place to stay, so one will need to stay in Bend or Sunriver somewhere and drive each day to the Mt.
The best time to use an Ikon at Bachelor will be spring, and then it will be icy to slushy deal, with maybe an hour of good carving each day.
Because of these factors, I don't see Bachelor as being some great deal for Ikon pass holders.

 

[cantunamunch]

No on mt. place to stay, so one will need to stay in Bend or Sunriver somewhere and drive each day to the Mt.
The best time to use an Ikon at Bachelor will be spring, and then it will be icy to slushy deal, with maybe an hour of good carving each day.
Because of these factors, I don't see Bachelor as being some great deal for Ikon pass holders.

Looking at the same facts from a different angle - Bachelor has East Coast spring conditions for two months or more after EC resorts are either closed or the IKON passers have used up their days.

Mellow terrain? No high altitude problems? Powder skis and powder skills not required? Bluebird skies? Cheaper than California? Equally as easy to access as Mammoth?

Stratton skiers and Snowshoe skiers won't give a flying flip about 360 skiing - and their entire seasons have been nothing but yoyos between icy and slushy.

 

[KingGrump]

Good luck with Bachelor. Due to regular horrible weather with fog, rime, ice and wind, the Summit lift can rarely be opened.
If it is not, there will be no 360 skiing.
Not to mention the same with the Northwest and Outback lifts. During storm cycles only a few lifts will be open.
If you get lucky, you might have a few good days in a seven-day deal.
There is no easy way to get there without changing planes several times. Redmond airport is small.
No on mt. place to stay, so one will need to stay in Bend or Sunriver somewhere and drive each day to the Mt.
The best time to use an Ikon at Bachelor will be spring, and then it will be icy to slushy deal, with maybe an hour of good carving each day.
Because of these factors, I don't see Bachelor as being some great deal for Ikon pass holders.

You and @Sibhusky should get together and start an ad agency for Whitefish and Bachelor.

 

[Jacques]

Looking at the same facts from a different angle - Bachelor has East Coast spring conditions for two months or more after EC resorts are either closed or the IKON passers have used up their days.

Mellow terrain? No high altitude problems? Powder skis and powder skills not required? Bluebird skies? Cheaper than California? Equally as easy to access as Mammoth?

Stratton skiers and Snowshoe skiers won't give a flying flip about 360 skiing - and their entire seasons have been nothing but yoyos between icy and slushy.

Ha ha! No laugh button!

 

[Jacques]

You and @Sibhusky should get together and start an ad agency for Whitefish and Bachelor.

Ha ha! See above reply and video!

 

[LegacyGT]

Obviously the current environment makes it hard to know what the future will bring. Still, I'd be hesitant to label this is a "win" for regular visitors to Windham or Mt Bachelor. I've been a passholder at Mt Snow for more than 30 years and when Vail purchased Peaks it was hard to see anything other than positives. I won't comment here on how the mountain was managed differently under Vail (I'm sure there would be plenty of disagreement) but I can say that the mountain was objectively more crowded than it ever has been, and significantly so. My sense is that, given how these passes are priced, anyone planning a destination ski trip to a Vail or Ikon resort for more than a couple of days is incentivized to buy the pass. So this means that the barrier to entry for a day or weekend trip to a sister resort close to home is very low. So that means a lot of customers from NYC who otherwise wouldn't go to Windham, might take a day or weekend trip there. Same thing for Portland residents and Mt Bachelor. This past winter was not a particularly great one at Mt Snow but I still saw some of the biggest crowds I've ever seen there. I expect much of this was because of customers who already held a pass and decided to come for a day or two.

 

[Tahoma]

This is great news. Bachelor was a hard sell before. No lodging near lifts, expensive lift tickets but now at least one hurdle is removed. I think when I switch back to Ikon in season after next, I will plan a trip to Bachelor.

If you have kids 12 and under, their Kids Ski Free deal is very attractive. And there are lots of good lodging options in Bend and Sunriver, both of which are about 20 minutes away from the main day lodge parking.

My family loves Mt. B, and up until this season we've gone yearly. My daughter pretty much grew up skiing there, and still looks forward to seeing her favorite instructors. And my wife who skis Nordic only loves that there is a nice Nordic area right across parking lot from the West Lodge!

Adding Mt. B to Ikon makes it much more likely that we'll re-up for next season!

 

[Tahoma]

That drive can be amazing. It’s an easy drive, Mostly a straight shot without any major turns and no steep hill climbs, but the transition between climate zones is amazing. On a blizzard day with wind in which only a few lifts were running and driving back to town with compact snow on the road with whiteout conditions near the mountain, to sunny and dry by the time you hit town, all within a 20 mile drive. I’ve never experienced that anywhere else.

So long as you leave reasonably early, it's an easy drive. the OR DOT does a good job of maintaining the road.

One of my best memories is from two years ago, when we introduced my wife's brother and his family to Mt. B on family Christmas vacation. We drove up from Sunriver on a bluebird morning, and just as we got to the junction of Rd. 45 with Century, the mountain popped out from behind the trees in all her glory. Our guests let out a collective "WOW!"

 

[Tahoma]

I've wanted to ski Mt Bachelor for a long time, so I am excited by this news.

While Mt Bachelor certainly holds an appeal for many of us ski bums, I can't imagine that east coasters are really going to make much of an impact on Mt Bachelor with it's limited inclusion on the Ikon Pass. You have to fly past areas that much easier to get to (shorter flights + shorter travel times to the mountain), have better expert terrain, have "better" snow (I would bet that many would prefer Aspen's < 300 inches to Mt Bachelor's > 400), or have slope-side lodging. Again, don't get me wrong, I'm super interested in Mt Bachelor and I'm sure others on this forum are as well, but I would guess that the average east coast destination skier is much more interested in Aspen, Steamboat, Alta/Snowbird, Jackson, Winter Park, Copper, Big Sky, Squaw/Alpine, Revelstoke, or Mammoth than Mt Bachelor.

The target market here are probably people from the Seattle metro area who are skiing at Crystal and would consider a couple of weekend trips to Mt Bachelor, or people from the Portland metro area who are interested in weekend trips to Mt Bachelor or Crystal, with the ability to fly to world-class destination resorts. I agree with an earlier post in this thread that I can't imagine Meadows or Timberline being interested in joining the Ikon Pass given the crowds that they already see, not to mention that these are even less appealing to destination skiers than Mt Bachelor. I could see Alterra or Vail buying one of these resorts as a local mountain to try and draw Portland metro skiers into their pass offering, but I don't see a partnership happening.

Yup. I live in Pugetopolis, and my family has made lots of trips to ski at Mt. B before it ever affiliated. Took advantage of their Kids Ski Free deal while our daughter was 12 or younger. Now that I can use the same pass at Crystal AND some of other resorts I plan to return to (A-Basin, Banff), it makes the decision to re-up very easy.

 

[Winks]

Wish Bachelor had been unlimited

 

[Mister Tea]

Careful what you wish for. The last thing I'd want is for my home hill to be unlimited on the Ikon pass.

 

[slowrider]

Ha ha! See above reply and video!

Yall over did it Jacques, A for effort.

 

[Jacques]

Yall over did it Jacques, A for effort.

Well, I guess someone could get lucky.
They show up and get a bluebird powder day. It snows 6 to 10 inches every night, but the sky is blue. There is no wind, ice, rime or fog. Temps, remain 20 F and below all day. The all lifts are running without issues. There are no lines, no waiting. This goes on for five days!
Oh no! It was just a dream!

 

[slowrider]

Their IT & customer service is subpar. The lift service failures are almost a trademark. Always a day late & behind the 8 ball. What they do have are plenty of excuses. Poor performance starts at the top.

 

[DanoT]

Their IT & customer service is subpar. The lift service failures are almost a trademark. Always a day late & behind the 8 ball. What they do have are plenty of excuses. Poor performance starts at the top.

I have done 3 ski trips to Bachelor and I have found that it is quite common when sharing a chairlift ride with a local, they will not wait long to start bitching about the ski area management and how poorly they run the place.

 

[slowrider]

I prefer to keep it positive while I'm skiing Dano. However, a constant source of disappointment and lame excuses from them becomes ridiculous and a insult to your intelligence. Remember when they lost PCMR.