Ski (4) Colorado – Loveland

I nowadays often receive emails from Loveland and asks me to buy yearly pass 🙂 Their yearly pass is cheap almost like one week ski passes. Loveland is the closet to Denver compared to other big ski resorts like Vail and Copper Mountain. There is no fancy ski town, but you can find a tiny town with hotel lodges and a few restaurants, called Georgetown Colorado, along Route 70. It is about 15-20 minutes away from Loveland ski area. You need to book hotels there as early as possible, as the rooms are out fast.

The loveland ski area has two parts: Loveland valley and Loveland basin. Loveland valley is great for family and beginners. They have the best teachers and appropriate beginner slopes for exercises (go for two trails at the lift 7). You don’t need to sign one-to-one lessons, as their group lessons are just wonderful. My son went to the magical carpet first day with a group lesson, and then at the 3rd or 4th day, he was already at the green; at the last day, he was already at the most difficult green/blue. There are 2-3 greens as well as blues in loveland valley, with very long cruising, enjoyable runs (with cliffs and curves). Importantly, there were short lines at the lifts when we were there compared to Breckenridge. Then the best is of course the price 🙂 The loveland valley costs only $50 for adults and $30 for kids. You can’t beat this anywhere. But the whole mountain pass includes the loveland basin will cost $149 for adults and $45 for kids in main seasons. Loveland basin considers a bit challenging terrains many blues and blacks, and not many greens.

The parking is close to lifts. However, loveland valley parking lot is small and often full. So we park at the loveland basin and took their shuttles to commute morning and evening and during lunch time.

It is always good to buy some snacks as breakfast or lunch when you go ski, as the food is often just so so in ski lodges with long lines. But Georgetown has this cool restaurant which had excellent mountain views and is built on top of a creek :).

Denver has excellent green tomato and Mexican food. There is one Mexican restaurant we love to go, called Chili Verde.

Besides rocks, I also find Colorado honey is admirable. I bought honey sunscreen, honey lotions and various flavors of honey, and enjoyed the Colorado mountain scent every day.

Besides ski, somehow we still managed to meet some good friends from Virginia and Rochester. Those are years-old friends, and so very special. I found that in addition that ski itself is fun, there are many social aspects of this sport and people who love this sport are often so kind and pleasant.