You think they have a lot now you should have seen it 35+ years ago! In New England many places there would be a ski hill within 30mins of driving in any direction.
@@aaa-rw3ne that’s because Montana Snowbowl gets super crowded these days! Not to mention, its terrains are AMAZING! Lookout Pass is my favorite too, but the terrains aren’t quite as impressive.
Thank you gentleman!!! Areas like this are what will save the ski industry. Corporations like Vail and Alterra are rapidly destroying skiing!! The average family cannot afford the sport now and corporate ski areas are still jacking up the costs.
This great! There are soooo many abandoned ski areas here in New England. With tickets pushing $219 walk up prices on peak days (talk about gouging) - locals can only afford to work the areas but not be just a local skier.
When I was in High School 30+ years ago, we had a school trip down to this area of Colorado. I've always remembered that trip, and the beauty in this part of the state!
Beautifully done, beautifully portrayed. This is a spectacular way to push away boredom and create fun and mastery in the process. If it helps the town commercially, that's really just an added bonus.
I learned to see here when I was a child. We'd come down from Pueblo, as we were a low income family and got to experience the joy of skiing. Going to come down now with my family.
We need more small, community-run ski areas. For the kids, and even adults, just learning to ski for the first time, a monster resort is absolutely NOT necessary, and can actually spoil their fun.
Great clip! I grew up in So. NJ where I learned to ski at Pine Hill. My Dad was a volunteer ski patroller so we had passes. Now I live in a small CO town that is trying to acquire a ski resort that used to be local.
So glad the community was able to get it instead of developers .... That area is very special, I live in Colorado and look forward to coming to snowboard sometime! :) and supporting the local restaurants and businesses!
Great job folks!! I hope the weather remains favorable in the coming years, and you all have great success and fun with it. My great uncle and my dad started Mott Mountain Ski Area near Farwell, MI in the early 60's, and it went through a similar scenario and now sits abandoned.
I love these old school (family owned) ski areas. Support them... yes its not a high speed quad to the tippy top of black diamond runs, buts its great for your friends and family. And Way Cheaper! If your in New Mexico have a look at Sipapu!
That’s great. We still have 1 small mountain near me in Central New York that’s affordable and some schools offer ski club at even more discounted rates. It’s how both my kids got the opportunity. They’re both out of school and still into the sport because of that mountain. These things are important for children. Excellent job!
We are all hoping Big Tupper NY comes back. Even us folks in Lake Placid with access to Whitface. It’s a real mountain with a chair, abandoned snow making, lodge, parking. So much potential. Just bought at auction for a few hundred thousand.
Tupper was a great little place. Skied there a lot back when I went to Paul Smiths. Loved Whiteface as well,especially when we had the Nationals there in '73, and hope to get back there again next winter.
That’s awesome. As much as I love the popular big name resorts, I mainly ski smaller local resorts. Fight back against the monopolies of the ski industry!
I appreciate that those people put the effort in doing this... in a country where lift tickets are shockingly expensive. Now to put this into a different perspective, 40$ would be approximately what you pay per day when you buy a 6 day pass in most of the resorts of the European alps (France/Austria), for a quite different experience in terms of infrastructure (food, accommodation, 100+km of slopes, detachable ski lifts, etc...). But at least they offer a real alternative to Vail and if some local kids who never went to the snow get a chance to experience skiing thanks to this kind of initiative, it's fantastic ! I hope the Americans will slowly get their mountains back.
So glad to see this skiing use to be so affordable when I started in 2006 now it's even more expensive then a day at Disney and I thought that was insanity.
This is fantastic! I lived in Colorado Springs in the 70's for several years after growing up in Wisconsin. I would go skiing a few times a year and I recall lift tickets were maybe about $16 to a place like Copper Mountain. When I hear about the current rates I'm absolutely floored.Hope this can work!
@@Trapper50cal I keep trying to find someone that know how to access the hill. I can see it from my house and it holds snow well. Want to go make some (maybe illegal) turns?
WOW! My grand uncle lives in Cuchara and it is a beautiful place, I went there back in 2017 I think and I loved it, seeing the stars in the sky is really cool too! Never knew there was a ski resort there!
So grateful I was raised in Colorado when the people were real, like this. $300 for a lift ticket🤯 I learned to ski by joining the ski club, Snow Dodgers, in Clear Creek county schools. We were bussed to Loveland Ski area, for morning lessons & afternoon practice, great memories!
I taught my 3 kids to ski and board at a similar type of place in Branford, Massachusetts in the early 2000’s. Friday night lift ticket was $12.50 and rental was $12.00. It’s where I learned to ski. I never could have afforded to bring them to Vermont for the big mountains but was a perfect place to learn close to home. 8 minutes on a chairlift with your 6 year old after school….absolutely priceless.
I grew up in southeastern Colorado and have fun memories of skiing at Cuchara when I was a kid. I'm glad these folks are attempting a nonprofit, local, strategy.
@@rockymtnpbs When it comes to getting rentals, I suggest that you contact Perfect North in Lawrenceburg, IN to see what their package is when it will be available again,and how much it will cost. PN is another great little place run by a Perfect, family that has survived 42 + Indiana winters and is exactly the type of place you want to be.
Love it! I taught skiing at our local hill for a few years, then moved and "tried out" to be a ski instructor at a for profit place. I made the cut but turned them down. The small hill had a goal of making skiing fun and turning our students into skiers. The for profit stressed that we needed to get our students to come back for more lessons--point out that they needed constant improvement. I had a day job so could turn the job offer down.
Do a report on Arapaho East. South of I70 around Floyd Hill area, $7 lift tickets. I volunteered there on the ski patrol. Now the ski area has been replaced with mansions owned by flat-landers. I remember Cuchara and my favorite Guanella, both in the history books.
Guanella Pass ski hill was fantastic. With the growth of SW Denver and up 285 I think this place would still be open, if it made it thru the tough times.
When I lived in CO, I was always fascinated with the history of Cuchara, mainly because of its location. There's a great youtube video called Abandoned, which covers a few abandoned ski areas in CO, that first got me interested in Cuchara. Sadly, I never got the chance to ski there before moving back to CA, but I will try if the weather and fates align sometime in the next couple years.
I enjoy skiing the smaller community based places over the mega resorts where they charge an arm and a leg. I would definitely make a trip to Cuchara if I still lived in Colorado but the state of Washington also has it small community based resorts too.
Sounds a bit like the club fields in New Zealand - these are local clubs (mostly started in the 1930s-50s) that built and ran ski areas for their members, not as a business. Today they sell day lift tickets to the public, but as a club all the money goes back into the club facilities.
I have seen mountains like this in Virginia put in 8 Downhill trails, weld together some fixed arm bike carriers. Instead of oxidizing and be pollinated on all summer the lift are running being maintained and turning a profit.
Those are the real resorts. Serious, NEVER give this up. For such small community it could offer HUGE chances for the younger. That 150k$ was peanuts. Take it for granted, make most out of it regardless what.
Great Resource I Hope it develops.A Little Coffee Shop and A Spa Health Facility (Sauna's and Jacuzzi) would bring in more Customers after A Skiing Session to Warm them up.🙂👍Best of Luck
Rich Texans that sounds about right, I was in Colorado and I'm from TX, I went to a shop very early and they opened up for me. I asked do y'all usually open this early. They said no we don't open for ppl from Colorado but we seen your TX plates on your nice truck so ...😂
Perfect set up for a lift access downhill mountain bike park. Could help the nonprofit make money all year around. Would also help the local economy. Assuming they don’t do that already.
Cuchara's has always been a challenge because of the unpredictable snow. Otherwise, it's a great little ski area and I spent a lot of delightful summers in Cuchara camping and fishing. Too many Texans, though.
If you all want to get rich and have a life long fan base again bring some concerts this year Circles around the sun and grateful shred small California. Grateful Dead style bands with small younger crowds we all need that!
What if a nonprofit set up a wind/solar powered lift on Berthoud Pass or a hill near the YMCAs? Corporate skiing is so pathetically elitist it's time to take back public lands and shame the corporations into more affordable options especially for kids.
A bike park during the summer would also be great!
Karachi shuffle
Absolutely! Great location. Build it and WE will come!
@@kevinkrayna3097 that’s exactly why they shouldn’t build it…next thing you know the tiny hill is owned by vail
Love this, keep it small, tight knit, & affordable for the kids in mind who want this sport. Keep it going, pulling for you guys 👏❤.
Well, this episode probably just ruined that for them. So no, no bueno.
Need more of this. East Coast has so many little local hills, the Rockies need little local ski mountains!
I love ski hills in the local city parks like you sometimes get in VT and NH. Just awesome.
U just haven’t heard of them out West, but many of them exist: Montana Snowbowl, Lost Trail, Bogus Basin, etc. and MANY more
@@Nordicjumperlookout pass is way more local and small then montana snowbowl which is really expensive now
You think they have a lot now you should have seen it 35+ years ago! In New England many places there would be a ski hill within 30mins of driving in any direction.
@@aaa-rw3ne that’s because Montana Snowbowl gets super crowded these days! Not to mention, its terrains are AMAZING! Lookout Pass is my favorite too, but the terrains aren’t quite as impressive.
this is what skiing is all about. well done guys (and gals)!
Thank you gentleman!!! Areas like this are what will save the ski industry. Corporations like Vail and Alterra are rapidly destroying skiing!! The average family cannot afford the sport now and corporate ski areas are still jacking up the costs.
Is it the corporations or the investment banks/hedge funds?
Profit before people. We need to reject corporations like we did the vaxxsheen jab.
This great! There are soooo many abandoned ski areas here in New England.
With tickets pushing $219 walk up prices on peak days (talk about gouging) - locals can only afford to work the areas but not be just a local skier.
When I was in High School 30+ years ago, we had a school trip down to this area of Colorado. I've always remembered that trip, and the beauty in this part of the state!
Beautifully done, beautifully portrayed. This is a spectacular way to push away boredom and create fun and mastery in the process. If it helps the town commercially, that's really just an added bonus.
I grew up skiing at Cuchara in the 90s. Played against La Veta in 8 man football too. Glad to see it open again!
Hey we used to play La Veta in hoops!
I learned to see here when I was a child. We'd come down from Pueblo, as we were a low income family and got to experience the joy of skiing. Going to come down now with my family.
We need more small, community-run ski areas. For the kids, and even adults, just learning to ski for the first time, a monster resort is absolutely NOT necessary, and can actually spoil their fun.
My mom grew up in Stonewall just on the other side of Cucharas Pass. I have always wondered about this ski area. So happy to hear it is back open!
Great clip! I grew up in So. NJ where I learned to ski at Pine Hill. My Dad was a volunteer ski patroller so we had passes. Now I live in a small CO town that is trying to acquire a ski resort that used to be local.
So glad the community was able to get it instead of developers ....
That area is very special, I live in Colorado and look forward to coming to snowboard sometime! :) and supporting the local restaurants and businesses!
Great job folks!! I hope the weather remains favorable in the coming years, and you all have great success and fun with it.
My great uncle and my dad started Mott Mountain Ski Area near Farwell, MI in the early 60's, and it went through a similar scenario and now sits abandoned.
I love these old school (family owned) ski areas. Support them... yes its not a high speed quad to the tippy top of black diamond runs, buts its great for your friends and family. And Way Cheaper! If your in New Mexico have a look at Sipapu!
That's awesome! This is what it takes. I recently volunteered in a small ski resort.
That’s great. We still have 1 small mountain near me in Central New York that’s affordable and some schools offer ski club at even more discounted rates. It’s how both my kids got the opportunity. They’re both out of school and still into the sport because of that mountain. These things are important for children. Excellent job!
We are all hoping Big Tupper NY comes back. Even us folks in Lake Placid with access to Whitface. It’s a real mountain with a chair, abandoned snow making, lodge, parking. So much potential. Just bought at auction for a few hundred thousand.
Tupper was a great little place. Skied there a lot back when I went to Paul Smiths. Loved Whiteface as well,especially when we had the Nationals there in '73, and hope to get back there again next winter.
That’s awesome. As much as I love the popular big name resorts, I mainly ski smaller local resorts. Fight back against the monopolies of the ski industry!
Wonderful sport and great experience for all especially the kids. Lifelong memories. This story warns the heart!
We need more of this. These small places are starting to pop up now in the Northeast.
I learned to ski there and Conquistador. It was great for what is was. ❤️
I love this!
Night skiing, rope tow terrain park, cut runs higher up the peak toward tree line. It's all there and there is a market. Mt Spokane is non profit too
This is everything right about wintersports ❤
I appreciate that those people put the effort in doing this... in a country where lift tickets are shockingly expensive.
Now to put this into a different perspective, 40$ would be approximately what you pay per day when you buy a 6 day pass in most of the resorts of the European alps (France/Austria), for a quite different experience in terms of infrastructure (food, accommodation, 100+km of slopes, detachable ski lifts, etc...). But at least they offer a real alternative to Vail and if some local kids who never went to the snow get a chance to experience skiing thanks to this kind of initiative, it's fantastic ! I hope the Americans will slowly get their mountains back.
This is so great! :) Wishing you the best in this endeavor.
In the summer, difficult to find a more beautiful place, to picnic, hike, and enjoy mountain scenery without any crowd.
This is great....long may it get snowy winters and give local folk a place to ski.
Only option similar is snowy range. Hope more of these pop up. Everyone should be able to afford to enjoy skiiing!!
So glad to see this skiing use to be so affordable when I started in 2006 now it's even more expensive then a day at Disney and I thought that was insanity.
This is the change we need! Make it clear we won't pay for $1100 for a bad season of skiing! Buy small, keep it fun
Just being outdoors for a few hours, this is the best!
This is fantastic! I lived in Colorado Springs in the 70's for several years after growing up in Wisconsin. I would go skiing a few times a year and I recall lift tickets were maybe about $16 to a place like Copper Mountain. When I hear about the current rates I'm absolutely floored.Hope this can work!
Ski Broadmoor, baby! (At least in the 70's/80's)
We saw the “hills” in WI used for skiing, did you ski in WI?
@@Trapper50cal I keep trying to find someone that know how to access the hill. I can see it from my house and it holds snow well. Want to go make some (maybe illegal) turns?
@@PeaceOfGrace No. Colorado was where I started skiing, and it spoiled me. I moved back to Wisconsin eventually and never skied again.
@@Trapper50calYup. Learn to Ski there!
WOW! My grand uncle lives in Cuchara and it is a beautiful place, I went there back in 2017 I think and I loved it, seeing the stars in the sky is really cool too! Never knew there was a ski resort there!
So grateful I was raised in Colorado when the people were real, like this. $300 for a lift ticket🤯
I learned to ski by joining the ski club, Snow Dodgers, in Clear Creek county schools. We were bussed to Loveland Ski area, for morning lessons & afternoon practice, great memories!
I grew up in Colorado too.
Lift tickets were 20-25 bucks
Lift tickets at Arapahoe Basin were like $20 in the 80's
I remember seeing this area in the late 70s and being shown around my my friend, Cass Cruse, from LaVeta, Co.
I taught my 3 kids to ski and board at a similar type of place in Branford, Massachusetts in the early 2000’s. Friday night lift ticket was $12.50 and rental was $12.00. It’s where I learned to ski. I never could have afforded to bring them to Vermont for the big mountains but was a perfect place to learn close to home. 8 minutes on a chairlift with your 6 year old after school….absolutely priceless.
So wonderful. Would love to see a gofundme or kickstarter that people could donate to, to pay for kids to spend a day there, learning to ski.
I grew up in southeastern Colorado and have fun memories of skiing at Cuchara when I was a kid. I'm glad these folks are attempting a nonprofit, local, strategy.
Back in the 70's there was a small ski area between Denver and Evergreen right off of I-70 to the South.
Awesome. My kids learned to ski on Monarch. I’m going to have to try and make a trip out!
Really enjoyed this story.
thanks for watching!
@@rockymtnpbs When it comes to getting rentals, I suggest that you contact Perfect North in Lawrenceburg, IN to see what their package is when it will be available again,and how much it will cost. PN is another great little place run by a Perfect, family that has survived 42 + Indiana winters and is exactly the type of place you want to be.
Love it! I taught skiing at our local hill for a few years, then moved and "tried out" to be a ski instructor at a for profit place. I made the cut but turned them down. The small hill had a goal of making skiing fun and turning our students into skiers. The for profit stressed that we needed to get our students to come back for more lessons--point out that they needed constant improvement. I had a day job so could turn the job offer down.
Lessons for $300, but that pay the instructor $25 are kind of a joke. Local mountains are the way to go.
Do a report on Arapaho East. South of I70 around Floyd Hill area, $7 lift tickets.
I volunteered there on the ski patrol. Now the ski area has been replaced with mansions owned by flat-landers. I remember Cuchara and my favorite Guanella, both in the history books.
Guanella Pass ski hill was fantastic. With the growth of SW Denver and up 285 I think this place would still be open, if it made it thru the tough times.
A nonprofit resort that is named after spoons! For sure gonna go.
When I lived in CO, I was always fascinated with the history of Cuchara, mainly because of its location. There's a great youtube video called Abandoned, which covers a few abandoned ski areas in CO, that first got me interested in Cuchara. Sadly, I never got the chance to ski there before moving back to CA, but I will try if the weather and fates align sometime in the next couple years.
You have no shame about California eh
@@keim3548 What do you mean?
Yes Thank You
Bike park would keep it open! Mtb folks would love it too!
I enjoy skiing the smaller community based places over the mega resorts where they charge an arm and a leg. I would definitely make a trip to Cuchara if I still lived in Colorado but the state of Washington also has it small community based resorts too.
Wayyyy COOL!!!!, GO COLORADO/CUCHARA!!!❤❤❤
I will be making a visit there this year!!!!
This is so awesome.
If I lived in Colorado, this is where I’d want to be perfect
You could put in a zip line. Check out what Leavenworth Washington State has added for summertime activities plus winter wonderland 😊
How REFRESHING is this after just learning about the HUGE CORPORATION that is VAIL!
Best of luck to them. Big middle finger to Vail.
Wonderful story 🥹
Sounds a bit like the club fields in New Zealand - these are local clubs (mostly started in the 1930s-50s) that built and ran ski areas for their members, not as a business. Today they sell day lift tickets to the public, but as a club all the money goes back into the club facilities.
Great story!
I remember not long ago when vail had $40 lift tickets 20 years ago.
Sick what they did
I think i skied their in 1998, awesome little hill
I have seen mountains like this in Virginia put in 8 Downhill trails, weld together some fixed arm bike carriers. Instead of oxidizing and be pollinated on all summer the lift are running being maintained and turning a profit.
Those are the real resorts.
Serious, NEVER give this up. For such small community it could offer HUGE chances for the younger. That 150k$ was peanuts. Take it for granted, make most out of it regardless what.
Reminds me of ski areas in the South and Mid-Atlantic that rely on snowmaking and cold temps, a little luck and a whole lot of chutzpah! Hup, hup.
So awesome. Get back to true skiing. Love the small community feel.
Kind of reminds me of Shepherd Mtn Bike Park in MO
Keep it up!
Thought this was about Snowbowl in Missoula 😊😅
I would so go if this was closer to me !
Very Cool
Need some summer camping and mountain bike trails, could be a year round place.
Great Resource I Hope it develops.A Little Coffee Shop and A Spa Health Facility (Sauna's and Jacuzzi) would bring in more Customers after A Skiing Session to Warm them up.🙂👍Best of Luck
Rich Texans that sounds about right, I was in Colorado and I'm from TX, I went to a shop very early and they opened up for me. I asked do y'all usually open this early. They said no we don't open for ppl from Colorado but we seen your TX plates on your nice truck so ...😂
I want to visit!
Perfect set up for a lift access downhill mountain bike park. Could help the nonprofit make money all year around. Would also help the local economy. Assuming they don’t do that already.
Have you ever heard of Blizzard Mountain near Sun Valley?
i lived in walsenburg for a couple years. i wouldnt recomend it. but its beautiful everywhere around there.
Bout 30 years ago I had a season pass to Cuchara
Cuchara's has always been a challenge because of the unpredictable snow. Otherwise, it's a great little ski area and I spent a lot of delightful summers in Cuchara camping and fishing. Too many Texans, though.
you are so correct about Texans
Up next… The Panadero Downhill!
🤘😎
I don't go to CO anymore. I escape to the mountains for solitude not to be around the Masses. Been going to PAC northwest last 20 years. Much better!
Open a bike park in the summer 👏🏼
There’s a disc golf course but it could have a championship level course that charges 5 bucks
YES!
We need more of these ski hills. Vail Resorts is ruining the sport with their over the top greed.
$40, where is it? Courchevel?
Wonderful❤mt. Bache,or in Oregon is for sale. Bend, OR community is trying to purchse.
Wow only 150k? I must be missing something here. That's cheaper than a nice Sprinter van camper.
awesome
Last time I went skiing lift tickets were 21$ for a full day pass
Just put an old school saloon at the base and I will visit.
If you all want to get rich and have a life long fan base again bring some concerts this year
Circles around the sun and grateful shred small California. Grateful Dead style bands with small younger crowds we all need that!
I live in Weston.
Yesssss!!!
What if a nonprofit set up a wind/solar powered lift on Berthoud Pass or a hill near the YMCAs?
Corporate skiing is so pathetically elitist it's time to take back public lands and shame the corporations into more affordable options especially for kids.
Yeah, wow $40 bucks, those are mid to late 1980's prices
Vail heard: “local community ski project primed for corporate annihilation”
Dam $40 seemed like a lot. 😅