It took awhile for the snows to come, but when they did, it was epic.  Crystal Mountain experienced over ten feet of snow in 13 days.  The depth of the snowpack at Alpental is a reported 168 inches at the top.   At Mt Bachelor the snow depth is 150 inches at mid-mountain, and after 14 days of continual snow, the Summit chair lift station was completely filled with snow on the inside, right up to the roof.

What this all means is the Spring skiing ought to be fabulous anywhere you want to go in the West.

Are you the kind of person who, when looking to buy a car, walks into the dealership, points at a car, and says “what’s the most I can pay for it?”  If so, you shouldn’t read any further, because you wouldn’t really be interested in saving money on lift tickets.  But for the rest of us who like getting a bit of a bargain, you might consider browsing the deals offered at either Liftopia.com or GetSkiTickets.com.

These websites are easy to use, because if I can do it, anyone can.  Here is a sample of what you might find.  Liftopia offers a 3 out of 5 day lift ticket to Sun Valley for as low as $190, and this includes $45 dollars of lunch credits in the resort lodges.  You can get a two-day lift ticket at Mt Hood Meadows for $84.  A 3 day ticket at Red Mountain in BC (one of my favorites) costs as little as $114 (40% off).  If Utah is your powder paradise of choice, try Snowbasin for 3 days at only $150 (42% off).

GetSkiTickets has similar deals, though my investigation indicates this web-based service doesn’t have quite as many offerings as does Liftopia.  Nevertheless, using either site is simple; search by region, resort, date you want to go, or maybe just by price.  The cool thing is you can feel really good about minimizing the lift ticket cost well before you head off to the mountains.

I should also caution that you will get way better selection the sooner you start shopping, as many of the deals have a limitation on the number available.  For instance, finding something low cost for the next two weeks is a difficult proposition, but the selection for mid-March and beyond is excellent.  This is also true earlier in the season; shopping in October produced better results than shopping in December.

Everyone complains about the high cost of participating in snowsports, but unlike the weather, here are two companies actually doing something about it.  Of course, if you don’t like the idea, you can still pay full price at the resort ticket window.  If you do, I’ll bet my smile is bigger than yours.