Maybe not the best board - X posted from Across the Globe

Have lived in Texas my entire life but I don't feel it's long for me and the family forever.

I love the outdoors but living in DFW sucks. I try to go skiing 2x a year and do our summer vacation in CO, OR, MT every year.

My wife works in education and I do accounting/consulting. I could find a full remote job if it was right.

We'd love to start looking and getting ideas of western mountain areas.

Would love some suggestions and ideas or start a general discussion of where to consider. This would be a more "remote" move idea. Not Denver. Not Portland. Not Salt Lake.

I've thought about Bend, OR, Boise, ID, Bozeman (probably too expensive), Glenwood springs or Pagosa Springs, CO. Maybe Gunnison? I think Utah is out because of LDS. Maybe even around Tahoe area.

What say ye?

Was up in Whitefish, MT last year and loved it.

How familiar are you with West Texas?maybe Alpine, TX?

Actually have a buddy with a place in Whitefish… the town is trying to keep it from getting invaded with STR bans.

Those are COLD and long winters. Kinda too hard to get to…

No thanks on that far West Texas. Need to be, likely, within 1.5 hours from a commercial airport.

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I've thought about Bend, OR, Boise, ID, Bozeman (probably too expensive), Glenwood springs or Pagosa Springs, CO. Maybe Gunnison? I think Utah is out because of LDS. Maybe even around Tahoe area.

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Glenwood Springs is more like 3 hours from Denver Int'l in good weather/traffic. Doesn't help that the airport is way out east of town. Pagosa Springs is pretty remote. But definitely a great place to find nature.


Looked at or around Santa Fe? St. George, Utah?

How about eastern mountains? Like, Chattanooga, Tennessee? You won't be snow skiing around there, but absolutely beautiful country with lots of nature. Nashville and Atlanta airports are right at 2 hours away.

ChoppinDs40 said:

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Need to be, likely, within 1.5 hours from a commercial airport.

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Cheyenne is about 1.5 hrs from DIA

TXAggie2011 said:

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I've thought about Bend, OR, Boise, ID, Bozeman (probably too expensive), Glenwood springs or Pagosa Springs, CO. Maybe Gunnison? I think Utah is out because of LDS. Maybe even around Tahoe area.

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Glenwood Springs is more like 3 hours from Denver Int'l in good weather/traffic. Doesn't help that the airport is way out east of town. Pagosa Springs is pretty remote. But definitely a great place to find nature.


Looked at or around Santa Fe? St. George, Utah?

How about eastern mountains? Like, Chattanooga, Tennessee? You won't be snow skiing around there, but absolutely beautiful country with lots of nature. Nashville and Atlanta airports are right at 2 hours away.

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True but Eagle/Vail isn't far, or Grand Junction, or Montrose... Doesn't need to be ultra major commercial air travel. Something that American can get to once per day. This is mostly for "people can actually come visit"... or should we need to fly out, even if inconvenient with layovers, we can.

No on east of the Mississippi. A key component of moving west is skiing and big sky country... and IMO, mountainous areas east of the 'sip are pure hillbillies or snowbirds from the eastern seaboard. No thanks.

TXAggie2011 said:

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I've thought about Bend, OR, Boise, ID, Bozeman (probably too expensive), Glenwood springs or Pagosa Springs, CO. Maybe Gunnison? I think Utah is out because of LDS. Maybe even around Tahoe area.

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Glenwood Springs is more like 3 hours from Denver Int'l in good weather/traffic. Doesn't help that the airport is way out east of town. Pagosa Springs is pretty remote. But definitely a great place to find nature.


Looked at or around Santa Fe? St. George, Utah?

How about eastern mountains? Like, Chattanooga, Tennessee? You won't be snow skiing around there, but absolutely beautiful country with lots of nature. Nashville and Atlanta airports are right at 2 hours away.

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I like your idea about Sant Fe or St. George but too "desert" I think. Also, Santa Fe isn't cheap and is full of west coast artsies. I presume you mean farther out of town.

St. George is also probably too desert-y.

I should've specified more... This move needs to be within 1hr drive of legitimate skiing opportunities. And I don't mean "oh it's gotta be 1hr from Vail"... But needs to be more than 1hr from some foothill skiing in West Virginia.

Glenwood Springs is kind of ideal.. You're <2 hours from Vail, Aspen, BC, Telluride but are in no means a "mountain resort" town...

Steamboat or northern Colorado could also fit the bill but there isn't much north of the Berthoud pass into Grand County. Far more remote and less flight options. However, being close to RMNP would be nice.

Around Ft. Collins would be cool too but no access to skiing, within reason.

Moved to Eagle (Vail) a little over 8 years ago and love it. I travel a lot for work and it's not an issue. If you get serious or are even just curious about the area would be happy to tell you the pros and cons.

Wherever you go I say do it. We moved here and knew no one and it's been a great experience.

If you're wanting remote and small town I'm not sure that's Boise or Bend. They're much smaller than DFW, but their metro areas are still 800k & 200k (respectively) in population.

You said Santa Fe is expensive in a response above, but I'd expect all you listed to be more expensive in just about every way. I could be wrong but seems intuitive.

Not sure how the others compare but I've heard Gunnison is the coldest city in CO for some reason. I love the town and would move there in a heart beat if I had the opportunity, but winter temps, snowfall amounts, and total daylight hours in December aren't something to totally look past if you've lived in Texas your whole life.

Glenwood Springs has proximity to 3 airports - Ege/Vail, Aspen, and GJ.

Sunlight is 25 minutes, Vail is 55 minutes away, BC is 45, Aspen Snowmass is 40, Copper is 1:15-20, and Telly is 3.5 hours.

It's a professional mountain town. Not a tourist mountain town. Mostly outdoors professionals. I do accounting and bookkeeping. Mostly heath care and education for industry.

I started to loathe the upper valley portion of ECO. It was just small budget energy and little boys and girls that never wanted to grow up on daddy's credit card. Eagle County is also becoming very very very woke. Garfield County, no so much.

Its also has an actual town and downtown area which is nice compared to Eagle County where everything's a 15-20 minute drive. We get about 1/2 to 1/3 of the snow in the high country too so it's easier to live and not just shovel snow non-stop for 4 months.

Housing is super crazy but hopefully getting better.

If you have any questions just lmk.

You'd probs also love the little towns off 82 between glenwood and Aspen - Carbondale, Basalt, El Jebel, etc.

Leadville's a super cool little town too. Close to BV and Salida, Ski Cooper/Monarch/Breck within an hour and Collegiate Peaks abound w incredible rafting fishing hiking and camping.

Based on other answers, I'd guess that would be "too expensive."

The way to clear the "too expensive" hurdle might be to look at places where the lower paid workers in higher end locales live. Victor, ID or Driggs, ID for Jackson Hole, etc.

I would check eastern Washington and Northern part of Idaho. Proximity around Spokane, WA, Coeur D, Alene and Libby, Montana. Plenty of small towns. But cold winter though. Durango, CO comes to mind. Close to telluride and other resorts. Not sure about the cost. Oregon is beautiful. Just avoid Portland and go for the airport and you'll be fine.

JustPanda said:

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Glenwood Springs has proximity to 3 airports - Ege/Vail, Aspen, and GJ.

Sunlight is 25 minutes, Vail is 55 minutes away, BC is 45, Aspen Snowmass is 40, Copper is 1:15-20, and Telly is 3.5 hours.

It's a professional mountain town. Not a tourist mountain town. Mostly outdoors professionals. I do accounting and bookkeeping. Mostly heath care and education for industry.

I started to loathe the upper valley portion of ECO. It was just small budget energy and little boys and girls that never wanted to grow up on daddy's credit card. Eagle County is also becoming very very very woke. Garfield County, no so much.

Its also has an actual town and downtown area which is nice compared to Eagle County where everything's a 15-20 minute drive. We get about 1/2 to 1/3 of the snow in the high country too so it's easier to live and not just shovel snow non-stop for 4 months.

Housing is super crazy but hopefully getting better.

If you have any questions just lmk.

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This is solid advice. I live in Meeker, could never live in GJT. Too deserty for my taste. GS is a nice place, I just couldn't afford my house in GS.

Newcastle is a great little town too. It's 10-15 minutes from GWS and the housing is far more reasonable than anything on 82. It's a gorgeous area w the Colorado river, hella fishing at the Gap and other reservoirs. Honestly the Rifle to GWS corridor is mostly just great hardworking people. Mix of Ag and white collar but all hard workers than enjoy the outdoors and want to keep the area as pristine as possible while balancing tourism and population growth.

I would second the suggestions about Leadville, and the Carbondales of Colorado. Job prospects tho, in the case you or the wife aren't always fully remote, won't be amazing, however.

There are a bunch of towns along the Wasatch range near Park City, if it's out of the budget. You're not far from Salt Lake and all it offers but wouldn't know it without looking at a map.

Take a look at Durango/Montrose/Quray/etc. in the San Juans. I suspect you'll write off Telluride as too expensive but there's stuff close

Ridgway and Ouray have gotten insane. Our house was $350-$375 5/6 years ago and the neighborhood is 3x that now. Between Cedaredge and Montrose isn't bad but it's ugly AF. Not sure what Durango looks like but I think everywhere in the San Juan's has gotten crazy.

One drawback to LV from TX would be the elevation change. Leadville sits at 10,000+ feet.

Maybe look into Blue River area too

I just got back from Pagosa Springs. Great town! Pretty low key and chill unlike the other popular tourist towns in CO. If you're looking for the quiet mountain town life I think that's a great place for it.

Downside: far from any major airports. Closest sizable city is Durango, about an hour drive.

Yeah, I do think one thing to keep in mind when looking at some of the non-major airports around Colorado is, beyond just the limited flight options, many are seasonal only. And you're going to pay a premium. They know who their customer base is. In my experience, you're usually looking at 2X the cost to fly in and out of Denver.

They aren't too bad if you use points and part of the reason you live here is because you don't want to travel far to enjoy life. In less than 2 hours I can be in Moab UT, Steamboat, Ridgway, Breck, Leadville/BV/Salida. The only real reason to travel is if we're going to the beach.

We only really fly internationally and on those flights we either fly out early AM or stay in Denver for the night, or fly non-stop out of Denver in the afternoon. Otherwise we drive most anywhere in CO or UT or NM.

We fly Economy Saver on United out of Ege and it's not bad at all. Ege has several non stop flights that don't go through Denver. GJ flies non stop to a couple of places (I know PHX), and Hayden flies a large amount of SWA.

Our trip to Playa in May was 40,000 miles round trip per person. That's very reasonable IMO. Obviously it's cheaper if you fly out of Denver but it's not a don't live here deal breaker by any means.

We both work remotely though so we have little to no work travel.

barbacoa taco said:

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I just got back from Pagosa Springs. Great town! Pretty low key and chill unlike the other popular tourist towns in CO. If you're looking for the quiet mountain town life I think that's a great place for it.

Downside: far from any major airports. Closest sizable city is Durango, about an hour drive.

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I think Durango has gotten pretty crazy. San Luis valley has Alamosa airport, rio grande, San Juans on one side, Sangre de Cristo on the other. Southfork, del Norte, etc.

Granby comes to mind also, may be too expensive.

I'm a fan of Durango. I think it has pretty regular flights in/out as well.

Alamosa Airport is dependent on federal subsidies and you'll be flying to Denver and changing airlines anytime you want to fly somewhere. Only mentioning these things as it seems having airport access is a factor.

You would have decent access to Wolf Creek and Monarch from Alamosa/San Luis valley.

The valley itself is really flat and not particularly beautiful, imo, and a lot of the hiking up in the Sangre de Cristos is pretty difficult; that might be just what you want. But you do get a deep "big sky" feeling driving up 285 or 17. It is fantastic to see the mountains on breakin up the horizon in nearly every direction.

jja79 said:

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Flagstaff. Arizona Snow Bowl has had 400 inches of snow this year. Short drive to Grand Canyon, Sedona and 2.5 hours to Phoenix for some winter warm weather.

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I wouldn't consider it remote. It's at the intersection of I-40 and I-17, and a University is located there.

No doubt but if he's coming from DFW it might seem remote to him.

Flag is fairly expensive as well, but a cool hippy mountain town. Stay away from St George, it is terrible and people should stop moving there…. /sarcasm. St George will be on my top of list when I can finally get to bug out of Texas for good as well. Also, Prescott Arizona is pretty great as well.

I need to spend some more time in Prescott but I'm pretty committed to relocating To Arizona at some point in the near future.

I should add that I grew up in a rural area and have spent summers in the San Luis, Gunnison area, buena vista, often.

I know the areas of CO fairly well but am thinking more into airports, harshness of winters, schools, industry for jobs.

Bigger question would be the Oregon, Idaho, Montana or Utah routes