BRECKENRIDGE, Columbia (CBS4) – The Holidays of Martin Luther King, Jr. they are usually one of the busiest ski communities. In one of Colorado’s most popular destinations, accommodation numbers are starting to show a downward trend.
MLK weekend room night data is not yet available, but the Christmas and New Year holidays ended nearly 17% less, according to Lucy Kay, CEO and president of the Tourist Office of Breckenridge.
“It’s about 4,000 nights in a room,” Kay said.
Kay updated Breckenridge City Council during a Jan. 12 meeting:
“Most of that drop in room nights for the holidays occurred during the last two weeks of December,” he said. “In the last two weeks of December there were many cancellations. There were also many reservations, but obviously many more cancellations than the reservations and, with the loss of the Lifestyle Group, I think many of them fell out of this window ”.
Summit County had a strong summer and a very busy fall, but things on the ski slopes have also felt calmer.
“Actually, I’ve heard that even with the ability they have, the crowds are pretty good,” said Denver resident Scott Cain.
Fox came to ski Breckenridge with his family friends over the weekend and by Sunday he hadn’t had to wait long in line.
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“The lines looked big, but they have them spread out so optically that it looked like there were a lot of people here, but there really weren’t any,” he said.
Cain was very disappointed when he headed to the base area on Sunday and saw that the crowd had increased significantly.
“We just went out on the slope and that’s a little ridiculous. It’s a lot of people, ”Cain’s friend Dan Fox said.
“We have kids up there somewhere, so we should probably go get them and wait for them and see if people leave here a little bit. It will be a little bit,” Cain added.
Cain and Fox believed that the reservation system along with the ever-changing restrictions may have deterred some people, the price they believed could be another.
While it is common for ticket prices to rise during the holidays, it caused a clash of stickers for Cain and Fox.
“I assumed $ 180 and I guess I was far away,” Cain said.
The price of a single Sunday was $ 209.
“This is such a beautiful place to visit and it’s getting too expensive,” he said.
Vail Resorts ensures that customers are advised to shop online at least a week in advance, for the guaranteed lowest price of lift tickets. Especially this season, as COVID security is a priority, all elevator tickets must be purchased online to limit contact points.
Steamboat Resort is another area with similar holiday prices. He says it’s one of the many ways to keep customers safe and minimize congestion.
“It’s a measure that Steamboat can limit capacity without the need for reservations for Ikon Pass holders or anyone who has purchased a package,” said Loryn Duke, a spokeswoman for Steamboat Ski & Resort Corp.
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While the price didn’t seem to deter crowds at Breckenridge Sunday, it’s still under capacity constraints and the more terrain it opens up, the more crowds there will be.
Not only bookings to stay in, but weekend vacation trips appear to be slightly lower than last year. The Colorado Department of Transportation says that despite a slightly lower number of motorists this year, people should be prepared for longer-than-normal travel times, especially with the snow coming in.
“In terms of traffic, it’s difficult to say with the ongoing pandemic and the reservation system for ski resorts, but we still expect heavy traffic to the east both today and tomorrow afternoon and, of course, the morning hours to the west. The traffic count for holiday weekends in 2020 was still comparable to the holiday weekends of recent years, though sometimes a little lower. The difference we see now is that heavy traffic is not always likely on weekends due to the possibility of working remotely, ”said Presley Fowler, CDOT communications coordinator.
Be sure to check cotrip.org before the trip for the latest weather and road conditions.