Speaking as someone who's lived in Denver for 6 years - my highly unpopular opinion is that skiing sucks.
People who head up for a grand ski holiday:
- Create obscene amounts of traffic
- Suck at skiing on the mountain (and create hazards for people who know how to ski)
- Are overwhelmingly wealthy (another example of wealthy people destroying nature, up there with excessive air travel)
Expensive ski resorts:
- Drive up the cost of living for everyone in the area, not all of whom are rich enough to not care about costs
- Destroy nature, both in physical footprint and energy needed to operate lifts, snowcats, and all the surrounding infrastructure
- Are a way to keep poor people out of public lands
- Are ugly af (my opinion)
Personally, I've stopped skiing because it:
- Requires driving up treacherous, icy roads, often in the dark, for multiple hours - while in rush hour traffic
- Is no longer within my risk-tolerance
- Is not fun to navigate thousands of tourists who don't know how to ski, as well as worry about a maniac flying by at 70 mph and nearly clipping me
- Is an exhausting way to spend a weekend (or weekday that I take off)
"What about the poor ski bums?" - find a new hobby. Being poor so you can go skiing every day is a lifestyle choice, not a fact of nature. The ski community contributes nothing of interest to our culture other than stupid catch phrases and music videos of them backflipping for the thousandth time.
People who head up for a grand ski holiday:
- Create obscene amounts of traffic - Suck at skiing on the mountain (and create hazards for people who know how to ski) - Are overwhelmingly wealthy (another example of wealthy people destroying nature, up there with excessive air travel)
Expensive ski resorts:
- Drive up the cost of living for everyone in the area, not all of whom are rich enough to not care about costs - Destroy nature, both in physical footprint and energy needed to operate lifts, snowcats, and all the surrounding infrastructure - Are a way to keep poor people out of public lands - Are ugly af (my opinion)
Personally, I've stopped skiing because it:
- Requires driving up treacherous, icy roads, often in the dark, for multiple hours - while in rush hour traffic - Is no longer within my risk-tolerance - Is not fun to navigate thousands of tourists who don't know how to ski, as well as worry about a maniac flying by at 70 mph and nearly clipping me - Is an exhausting way to spend a weekend (or weekday that I take off)
"What about the poor ski bums?" - find a new hobby. Being poor so you can go skiing every day is a lifestyle choice, not a fact of nature. The ski community contributes nothing of interest to our culture other than stupid catch phrases and music videos of them backflipping for the thousandth time.
/endrant