Got back Friday from a successful trip - thank you for all for your help! Turns out Crested Butte is a great place to learn to ski.
Summary: 4x4 is necessary, lessons are good, Crested Butte is a great place to learn, final ramp is steep, gear from Amazon is acceptable
Here's a long summary to help the next family.
We drove to Trinidad, Colorado (after a quick stop at the Cadillac Ranch) on Saturday and stayed at the Holiday Inn Express. The kids got to swim to burn energy, and stopping there allowed us to arrive early on Sunday to get checked in to our house and get our skis/polls/boots. We picked up groceries in Trinidad - they have a no grocery bag policy we wish we knew about before arriving.
We stayed in a house we found on AirBNB twith Aggie/church friends (4 adults and 5 kids) - it was about 10 minutes from the mountain. I was going to take our 2wd Toyota Highlander. Almost got chains just-in-case, but old TexAgs threads basically said "if you need chains you shouldn't be out anyway." We ended up renting a 4x4 and I'm glad we did (Costco Travel saves 20+% through AVIS and others...). I don't know if it was absolutely necessary, but I won't ever take a 2wd vehicle up there in snow season. I'm sure most of you knew that, but I didn't.
My 3.5 year old daughter is a princess, and I wasn't so sure she would even tolerate the cold. She did 2.5 days of group lessons (likely more productive than private lessons as mentioned above), and went up the lift and skied down a green with us on the last day! Not bad for a kid scare of escalators... I am extremely happy with how well she did, and thankfully she loves skiing.
My 7 year old son is an athlete, and was probably faster at going down any mountains than me after his second day of lessons. He did 2.5 days of lessons so he can turn with parallel skis, but is too competitive to ever turn to slow down. We went with a kid his age that is on his fourth year skiing, and my son made sure he was never the last down. He crashed a few times, but will never think of slowing down - luckily he's smart enough to stay on the trails. I'm 99% sure I'll never ski faster than him a day of my life, and that is tough to accept.
My wife is a good (great?) skier but took a half day of lessons because she's only skied a couple times the last 15+ years - she didn't need the lesson but is glad she took it. She had a great time.
I was the slowest person on the mountain the only other time I skied 9 years ago, but did much better this trip. I had 1.5 days of group lessons and had a great time. Both times my groups were very close to my skills/confidence levels. I did not try a single blue run but had a great time on all the greens. I was not the slowest any of the days. There was another couple in my class the first day that was skiing for the second time, and they did a half day of lessons - they later told me they wish they took more. I'm glad I had 1.5 days.
The mountain was awesome - I'm told it's not nearly as crowded as the other places. When you go, try to ski on the weekdays because there's so fewer people. A few of the greens - and a blue or 2 - end at one really wide slope that is probably too steep to be a green anywhere else. It's not ideal, but doable for beginners since it's so wide. Like other places, everything is expensive but nice. We paid a ton for our equipment rentals, but were able to valet them on-site at no additional cost. The food at the restaurants at the base were expensive, but food was good and they were filling.
As far as personal equipment goes, we bought ourselves and our kids cheap stuff from Amazon. I didn't know if we'd regret that or not. No regrets! For example, I bought a highly rated ski jacket for $40 and had low expectations. The only problem was that it got hot, all of the other features (mainly the many pockets) were surprisingly nice. I was worried our kids would get cold and/or things would break. We didn't have any issues with that stuff! I think it would be dumb to buy a growing child nice stuff unless you're skiing 20+ days a year. Somehow my wife's 15 year old north face snow boots basically exploded when she jumped down from trying on ski boots. There were literally no replacement snow boots her size in Mount Crested Butte for a day, then she had to overpay for ugly ones. Our friends' daughter outgrew her old gloves - the cheapest ones on-site that fit were $65. Our lesson: Buy cheap stuff if we're only going a few days a year.
Housing is so expensive I'm pretty dang certain that all the stores/restaurants in Mount Crested Butte and/or Crested Butte are awesome. We ate at Slogar as a group and loved it, but the best place was Secret Stash Pizza.
If you're thinking about taking a ski trip with your family, just do it! We had a great time, and are already planning our next trip. Thanks again for all the help, TexAgs!
Summary: 4x4 is necessary, lessons are good, Crested Butte is a great place to learn, final ramp is steep, gear from Amazon is acceptable
Here's a long summary to help the next family.
We drove to Trinidad, Colorado (after a quick stop at the Cadillac Ranch) on Saturday and stayed at the Holiday Inn Express. The kids got to swim to burn energy, and stopping there allowed us to arrive early on Sunday to get checked in to our house and get our skis/polls/boots. We picked up groceries in Trinidad - they have a no grocery bag policy we wish we knew about before arriving.
We stayed in a house we found on AirBNB twith Aggie/church friends (4 adults and 5 kids) - it was about 10 minutes from the mountain. I was going to take our 2wd Toyota Highlander. Almost got chains just-in-case, but old TexAgs threads basically said "if you need chains you shouldn't be out anyway." We ended up renting a 4x4 and I'm glad we did (Costco Travel saves 20+% through AVIS and others...). I don't know if it was absolutely necessary, but I won't ever take a 2wd vehicle up there in snow season. I'm sure most of you knew that, but I didn't.
My 3.5 year old daughter is a princess, and I wasn't so sure she would even tolerate the cold. She did 2.5 days of group lessons (likely more productive than private lessons as mentioned above), and went up the lift and skied down a green with us on the last day! Not bad for a kid scare of escalators... I am extremely happy with how well she did, and thankfully she loves skiing.
My 7 year old son is an athlete, and was probably faster at going down any mountains than me after his second day of lessons. He did 2.5 days of lessons so he can turn with parallel skis, but is too competitive to ever turn to slow down. We went with a kid his age that is on his fourth year skiing, and my son made sure he was never the last down. He crashed a few times, but will never think of slowing down - luckily he's smart enough to stay on the trails. I'm 99% sure I'll never ski faster than him a day of my life, and that is tough to accept.
My wife is a good (great?) skier but took a half day of lessons because she's only skied a couple times the last 15+ years - she didn't need the lesson but is glad she took it. She had a great time.
I was the slowest person on the mountain the only other time I skied 9 years ago, but did much better this trip. I had 1.5 days of group lessons and had a great time. Both times my groups were very close to my skills/confidence levels. I did not try a single blue run but had a great time on all the greens. I was not the slowest any of the days. There was another couple in my class the first day that was skiing for the second time, and they did a half day of lessons - they later told me they wish they took more. I'm glad I had 1.5 days.
The mountain was awesome - I'm told it's not nearly as crowded as the other places. When you go, try to ski on the weekdays because there's so fewer people. A few of the greens - and a blue or 2 - end at one really wide slope that is probably too steep to be a green anywhere else. It's not ideal, but doable for beginners since it's so wide. Like other places, everything is expensive but nice. We paid a ton for our equipment rentals, but were able to valet them on-site at no additional cost. The food at the restaurants at the base were expensive, but food was good and they were filling.
As far as personal equipment goes, we bought ourselves and our kids cheap stuff from Amazon. I didn't know if we'd regret that or not. No regrets! For example, I bought a highly rated ski jacket for $40 and had low expectations. The only problem was that it got hot, all of the other features (mainly the many pockets) were surprisingly nice. I was worried our kids would get cold and/or things would break. We didn't have any issues with that stuff! I think it would be dumb to buy a growing child nice stuff unless you're skiing 20+ days a year. Somehow my wife's 15 year old north face snow boots basically exploded when she jumped down from trying on ski boots. There were literally no replacement snow boots her size in Mount Crested Butte for a day, then she had to overpay for ugly ones. Our friends' daughter outgrew her old gloves - the cheapest ones on-site that fit were $65. Our lesson: Buy cheap stuff if we're only going a few days a year.
Housing is so expensive I'm pretty dang certain that all the stores/restaurants in Mount Crested Butte and/or Crested Butte are awesome. We ate at Slogar as a group and loved it, but the best place was Secret Stash Pizza.
If you're thinking about taking a ski trip with your family, just do it! We had a great time, and are already planning our next trip. Thanks again for all the help, TexAgs!