My daughter's birthday is in March and we wants to go "play in the snow and build a snowman" instead of doing a regular birthday party. She's turning 7 and she had fun when we got to hang out on Mt Lemmon last year for a day.

I'm using Southwest points for the trip so I'm looking at flying into Denver and driving from there. I'm good with 2 hours of driving.

We're not skiing, we just want a cool place that has snow and maybe some restaurants and what-not.

The only thing we've been able to find are the ski towns - Keystone, Breckenrige, winter park, Frisco, Copper mtn, vail, etc.

I guess we can go there, but prices are outrageous. Any tips from locals about where to stay and what to do? I'd ask the travel board but the OB is smarter...

Garden of The Gods maybe. It's near Colorado Springs. Southwest used to fly there, not sure they still do but it's still less than two hours from DIA.

https://gardenofgods.com/

We did a quick trip for my son's 10th birthday right before Thanksgiving. We stayed in Grand Lake in an Air BnB. Granby is nearby too. Grand Lake is more of a summer place, but is only about a mile from one of the entrances to Rocky Mountain National Park. That was the original plan for the trip. It changed later and we ended up skiing one day in Winter Park. It was a super easy trip. We also drove up from Texas.

Check this out. You could stay in Granby. It's a ski town but smaller and more affordable than Winter Park, Breckinridge, etc.

This place is incredible! https://ymcarockies.org/Locations/Snow-Mountain-Ranch

Fraser is also close by and has awesome toobing hills. It's closer to Winter Patk so lodging probably is higher.

That time of year, anywhere in the mountains will have plenty of snow you could drive to go play in. It'll be there until May/June. Just find a place you really like that's away from a ski area and rent something. That'll be off season for a non-ski location and rates should be reasonable. You can drive to a park or national forest and play in snow all day.

Southwest into SLC and 30 minutes of driving to Park City sound doable?

We just had the exact same trip for the exact same purpose and were inundated with snow. We stayed in/around Kimball Junction.

We looked at SLC/Park City but the flights are terrible with Southwest. I don't want to change planes with kiddos or fly through LA to get there.

We'll probably do that trip when they get a little older.

If you want affordable hotels, you need to be as far from the ski resorts as possible, so you will want to head southwest from Denver. Evergreen or Conifer are the areas you should be looking at.

Could even look at El Paso or ABQ and a short drive somewhere like cloudcroft

Head down to south park! Ample parking day and night! Lots of snow, no mountains. Or wave at south park on your way to salida
Fraser is a great idea, also estes park and avoid the i70 slog (probably not much cheaper than the ski resort towns)

Have you thought about Durango instead? You'll could do the train, walk along the river, snowmobile, etc.

Check out Estes Park and Rocky Mountain National Park. Could even stay in Boulder and drive up and back.

javajaws said:

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Have you thought about Durango instead? You'll could do the train, walk along the river, snowmobile, etc.

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This is what I was going to suggest. No brainer to me.

I live 1.5hr from Powderhorn resort which has plenty of snow and local activities. Could fly into Montrose on SWA.

lp01 said:

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We did a quick trip for my son's 10th birthday right before Thanksgiving. We stayed in Grand Lake in an Air BnB. Granby is nearby too. Grand Lake is more of a summer place, but is only about a mile from one of the entrances to Rocky Mountain National Park. That was the original plan for the trip. It changed later and we ended up skiing one day in Winter Park. It was a super easy trip. We also drove up from Texas.

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I've never been to Grand Lake in the winter but we love going there in the summer. I would imagine its a pretty sweet spot in the winter. Estes Park was miserably packed. Like the Gatlinburg of the Rockies...

It was perfect for what we wanted to do. Not a lot of options for shopping and eating, but we brought stuff to cook at the place we rented. Kids loved it. Very scenic and super close to the South entrance of RMNP. We drove into Granby and Winter Park a couple of times.

If I had to do it over, I think I would stay in Granby though. More options and was more centrally located to what we wanted to do (RMNP and skiing).

We rented a cabin in Green Mountain Falls one year. Right next to Colorado Springs and Garden of the Gods. Got plenty of snow, 6 year old son had a blast playing in the snow around the cabin.

streetfighter2012 said:

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Check out Estes Park and Rocky Mountain National Park. Could even stay in Boulder and drive up and back.

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This is a good suggestion.

Boulder is ~40-45 min from DIA. Then, it's another hour or so to Estes Park. From there, you could enter the south side of the park and play in the snow with some fantastic scenery. It's an easy drive; there are no high altitude passes that will make you pucker up.

There's like 4' of snow at Bear Lake right now. You could make an enormous snowman with that. Sledding is allowed at Hidden Valley. That's fun for kids.

There won't be the crowds in the park like there is during the summer months or which you'll find at a ski resort town. But if you're just looking for snow, scenery, and food, Estes Park is a good option to consider.

Estes Park all the way.

If you're not skiing avoid the ski towns. But get to good snow. Estes Park has that.

Estes Park is great for no Ski town. Rockmount Cottages by the River for the best place to stay.

Charismatic Megafauna said:

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Head down to south park! Ample parking day and night! Lots of snow, no mountains. Or wave at south park on your way to salida
Fraser is a great idea, also estes park and avoid the i70 slog (probably not much cheaper than the ski resort towns)

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This. We've done several quick trips to places around Fairplay. The last place we rented was incredible: Big Cabin Little Cabin

The pictures don't do it justice. Tons of other options in the area. There is not a ton to do in Fairplay, but there are a few restaurants and bars. It's about an hour from Breck or Salida if you wanted to take a day trip.

Salida is our family favorite. We stayed there for a month at the beginning of Covid when everything went remote. Went back last summer for a week. Rent a place near F Street and the river. Good restaurants, bars, breweries, etc. We've only visited in the summer, but I'm sure there is stuff going on year round.

Estes and RMNP are also fantastic.

Thanks for all the help! I've got some web-browsing to do this evening. To the poster that recommended SLC, it looks like that is back on the table as well. There's a couple of non-stop flights that work if we shift our timeline by 1 day.

Ruidoso, NM is a good one to consider. We rented a cabin over Christmas out there. ABQ and El Paso are options, but you'll still have a little more than two hours on the drive to get to Ruidoso.

I live in Denver and will echo the recommendations for Estes Park. We're headed there this weekend for a church group trip.

Salida is really cool, but it can die down a lot off season and will be over 3 hours drive from DIA.

EDIT: Pretty high likelihood of seeing herds of elk in Estes and Evergreen. In Evergreen you will very likely see 100+ in the fields on the south side of Squaw Pass Rd where it intersects Evergreen Pkwy (also called 74). They'll be there morning and evening into May and June, I've almost had some collisions while riding my motorcycle out there.

You can fly into Montrose (MTJ) using southwest. The towns near there would be Ouray, Silverton, Telluride, Crested Butte or Gunnison. Ouray is really beautiful, heated pool, places to eat and such.

If you just want snow and don't care about skiing go to New Mexico.

Fly into Denver. Drive to Evergreen. Can drive through Mt Evans. Evergreen is beautiful.

RightWingConspirator said:

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Ruidoso, NM is a good one to consider. We rented a cabin over Christmas out there. ABQ and El Paso are options, but you'll still have a little more than two hours on the drive to get to Ruidoso.

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Ruidoso resident here, if the desire is to stay somewhere where you can walk out your door and build a snowman it wouldn't be my recommendation (especially in March) as we don't stay snow covered in town all winter. You can get to snow, but you'd have to drive to Ski Apache or pay to go to the big tubing hill just outside town where they make their own. Cloudcroft would have a better chance to have snow on the ground in March but that's not a guarantee.

Hoyt Ag said:

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javajaws said:

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Have you thought about Durango instead? You'll could do the train, walk along the river, snowmobile, etc.

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This is what I was going to suggest. No brainer to me.

I live 1.5hr from Powderhorn resort which has plenty of snow and local activities. Could fly into Montrose on SWA.

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Western Colorado is more affordable than Denver or the ski towns. Southwest flies into Montrose. Powderhorn Ski area is family friendly and the most affordable in the state. This year they have great snow.

We have 3 rooms we rent out on Airbnb. This is the most expensive.

https://abnb.me/GHKAbyGyTwb

There are other great places in the area for a little more money. We are an hour and 20 minutes from the Montrose airport. 1.6 hours to Powderhorn.

We have snow, snowshoes, a fire pit for cold night star gazing.

Kurt Gowdy said:

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Southwest into SLC and 30 minutes of driving to Park City sound doable?

We just had the exact same trip for the exact same purpose and were inundated with snow. We stayed in/around Kimball Junction.

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^Solid option OP. Roughly a 30 minute drive from SLC to Park City and it's a cool town.

bam02 said:

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Check this out. You could stay in Granby. It's a ski town but smaller and more affordable than Winter Park, Breckinridge, etc.

This place is incredible! https://ymcarockies.org/Locations/Snow-Mountain-Ranch

Fraser is also close by and has awesome toobing hills. It's closer to Winter Patk so lodging probably is higher.

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This is a great suggestion. There's also a YMCA like this on the Estes Park side of RMNP. Highly recommend.

Can we chase mountain lions around if we rent a room at your place?

Well I will agree that the Grand Lake/Granby area is fun but the OP said he wants to be with a two hour drive. It's at least an hour just to get from DIA to the west side of Denver. Estes Park might be close to two hours but Estes Park and inexpensive don't really go together. That's why I suggested Garden of the Gods. Not nearly as cool as Grand Lake but easily less than two hours from the airport.

clinte234 said:

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Can we chase mountain lions around if we rent a room at your place?

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I wish! I haven't cut a lion track all winter. Talking with other guys, our population is way down from even 5 years ago.

Estes Park is a great place to get away from the ski areas. I would highly recommend staying at the YMCA of the Rockies on that side of Rocky Mountain National Park. They have a great sledding hill, a small pond you can ice skate on, a pool, and a roller skating rink. You will also likely see elk on the property any time of the year.

If they don't have room for you and the other places in Estes are too expensive, consider staying in either Loveland or Fort Collins. We live in the southwest part of Fort Collins, and it takes 40 minutes to get to Estes from our house. It's a beautiful drive up the Big Thompson Canyon. Plenty of hiking and snow playing in Rocky Mountain National Park.