Ski trips shouldn’t be relegated to the rich and even richer. We all deserve to go powder chasing midwinter without dissolving our bank accounts. But these days, finding a budget way to ski requires serious homework. You can always venture away from the headliner areas to smaller, less crowded local ski hills that want to entice visitors through budget deals, but you may have to sacrifice quality of terrain and convenient lodging. Or you could go early or late season, but that means gambling on snow conditions.

So, what if you want to go big—like, say, Jackson Hole, Wyoming, in mid-winter—but not spend big? It’s tricky but not impossible. Here’s how to visit a popular, world-class destination like Jackson Hole on a ski-bum’s budget. It’s also a great destination year-round, for hiking, biking, climbing, boating, fly fishing, and camping.

Getting to Jackson Hole, Wyoming

To reach Jackson, Wyoming, located at the base of the Teton Range, you can drive, fly, or take a bus. If you’re coming by car, it’s four and a half hours from Salt Lake City, Utah, or eight hours from Denver, pending road and weather conditions. offers bus routes into Jackson from Salt Lake City, Boise, or Las Vegas starting at $75. The Jackson Hole Airport has nonstop direct flights from 12 major U.S. cities, including Denver, Seattle, San Francisco, Dallas, Chicago, and Newark, but flights aren’t exactly cheap. United Airlines does offer an and $400 flight savings if you bundle lodging and airfare (deadline is by November 30, so save the idea for another year).

From the airport, hop a public bus or taxi into town. Don’t bother renting a car. Parking at the ski resort starts at $18 a day, so your best bet is to take the local ($3) from town or the Village Road Transit Center, and you’ll be dropped at the base of in Teton Village.

Lift-Ticket Deals in Jackson

If you can make it here early season, Jackson Hole Mountain Resort has a weekendÌęfrom December 6-8: show up wearing denim, and you can ski Saturday for $25 or get a three-day lift ticket for $199, plus half-priced gear rentals at and . Another great deal is that early or late season (November 29 through December 19 or March 17 through April 13), season passholders from any other ski area in the world can receive a 50-percent-off at Jackson Hole. Have an ? You can come midwinter and have up to seven days with the full Ikon Pass; five days with the Base Pass Plus (which has select blackout dates), . Otherwise your best option is to buy tickets online well in advance for the lowest rate (they start at $218 a day).

The best deal for skiing here isn’t at Jackson Hole Mountain Resort; it’s at , the town ski hill, which has big steeps and steep discounts. This is a much smaller ski area—500 acres compared to Jackson’s 2,500 inbounds acres—but its convenient location in town and minimal crowds make it a worthy destination, especially on a powder day. Single-day lift tickets start at $95, or with a $30 uphill ticket you can skin up under your own power and ski back down. The other hidden gem? , a 2,602-acre powder mecca just over Teton Pass, 45 miles or about an hour and 10 minutes from Jackson, where you can score a half-day ticket for $132. run from Jackson to Targhee and start at $199, which includes your lift ticket.

Hire a Backcountry Guide or Take a Lesson: Info But Sorry, No Discounts

There’s no discount way to book a ski lesson or hire a backcountry guide. You’ll pay a premium for these services. At Jackson Hole Mountain Resort, full day for experienced skiers start at around $379 (excluding lift ticket) per person. Resort for those just getting started skiing or wanting to progress to the next level start at $250 a day. If you’d rather not originate at the ski area, you can hire an AMGA-certified guide from for a tour of the terrain off Teton Pass or in Grand Teton National Park starting at $265 a person.

Find Cheap Lodging in Jackson

If you want to stay at the base of Jackson Hole Mountain Resort for the closest access to the lifts, your best budget option is (from $49), located right in Teton Village, which has both shared bunks and private rooms, plus a ski-tuning space, game room, and basic kitchen supplies.

Otherwise, stay in town—12 miles away—and you’ll have your choice of a few wallet-friendly accommodations. has newly renovated rooms starting from around $177, and . The (from $55) has pod-style bunks, free coffee, and storage lockers for stashing your gear. And the recently redone (from $160) has hot tubs and firepits, an on-site burger joint, and a walk-through or drive-through liquor store that also sells breakfast burritos in the morning.

Affordable Food and Drink Here

If you’re on the mountain or staying in Teton Village, prices for food and drink aren’t cheap, so you’ll want to know where to look, and you can always pack a PBJ in your pocket. Start with a cup of high-quality espresso from the take-out window at , next to the Mango Moose. The , at the gas station across the parking lot from the team in Teton Village, has a food truck out front and grab-and-go breakfast sandwiches and burritos. Mid-day or after skiing, hit up inside the Snake River Lodge for a $9 hot dog or tacos, or the , one of the most classic aprùs ski bars ever, which has $6 pizza by the slice. For fuel on the mountain, ride the tram to the top of Rendezvous Peak, take in the view of the Tetons from the observation deck, then pop into for an $8.25 house-made waffle with brown-sugar butter or Nutella. (Trust us, it’s worth every penny.)

In town there are lots of options for dining out, but many of them are pricy. Buying groceries at Albertson’s will save you. For other options, has tasty burritos from $11 or $6 tacos. Up a flight of stairs from Town Square, you’ll find , which slings thin-crust large pies starting at around $17, or pick up a $5 slice from .

With locations in downtown Jackson and, seven miles away, the town of Wilson, is a locals’ favorite for no-fuss coffee and bagel sandwiches (a naked bagel costs $1.50). And the best breakfast burrito in town is served until 2 p.m. out of a take-out window on Glenwood Street called , where for $12 you can get a massive burrito that’ll feed you for two meals.

Other Cool Outdoor șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍűs Here

It’s $5 to skate in the or on the (through the famous elk-antler arches) if you have your own skates (or $18, including the entry fee, to rent skates).

You’ll need to cross-country ski, snowmobile, or dog sled to reach , located south of town on Granite Creek Road, which is closed in the winter. It’s a 19-mile round trip ski to get there, but that’s the least expensive option ( rents Nordic skis from $40 a day; entry into the hot springs is $12) for this memorable day. Otherwise, you’ll need to throw down for a guided snowmobile trip ( leads them starting at $231) or a dogsled outing ( has full-day trips to the hot springs from $460).

It costs nothing to cross-country ski or fat bike along , a locals’ favorite trail that’s groomed in the winter and is a great biking and hiking trailhead in the summertime.

Another excellent year-round option is the short multi-use in the nearby town of Wilson.

Pro Tip

Here’s a fun way to be a conscientious visitor to the area, while scoring a discount: Support Jackson Hole’s community radio station, KHOL 89.1, with a of $60 or more, and you’ll get a member-benefit card for discounts to heaps of local businesses, including $2 off a burrito, 10 percent off Philly cheesesteaks at , 15 percent off at , 10 percent off at classes at , and free cross-country ski rental for two people at (that alone is worth $80).

Megan Michelson is an șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű contributing editor who loves skiing but not how expensive it is. She prefers the strawberry waffle from Corbet’s Cabin, and her favorite line at Jackson Hole is the very steep and very fun Tower Three Chute off Thunder Chair. Other recent articles by Michelson include “Why My Family Replaced Thanksgiving with Campsgiving,” about a great decision; a description of a tiny, remote backcountry hut, “This Is Hands-Down the Coolest Airbnb in Colorado”; and, more help with costs, “Shred This Colorado Mountain for $11 a Day—Plus Other Incredible Ski-Resort Deals.”

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The clanging of a majestic Austrian cowbell reverberated off the terminal walls, shattering a tranquil Saturday morning at the Salt Lake City International Airport. Wide-eyed passengers straightened in their seats to an eruption of applause as Peter Landsman emerged from the jet bridge with a modest smile on his face.

A crew of 10 fans, a decadently frosted cake, a Ski Utah Silver Ski Pass, and a handful of other gifts, including the 25-pound Austrian cowbell from the Doppelmayr ropeway company, were on hand to surprise Landsman at the airport. Landsman runs the popular LiftBlog.com website and has devoted himself to cataloging all the chairlifts, trams, and ropeways on the land. He was returning to his home in Jackson, Wyoming, having finally achieved his goal of visiting all 750 in the US and Canada to profile some 3,300 chairlifts.

Landsman’s journey ended at Moose Mountain T-bar near Dawson City in Canada’s Yukon on June 19, 2024. This public ski hill, without so much as a website, was the 750th on Landsman’s list and required five days of travel on either end to cap off his stellar achievement. The grueling travel, red-eye flights, sleepless nights spent driving, sleeping in ski resort parking lots, and Landsman’s diligent updates to the LiftBlog website are all a testament to his obsession.

Following his triumphant journey back to Jackson, we sat down with Landsman to discuss his decades-in-the-making accomplishment.

SKI: Now that you’ve completed your goal, how do you feel looking back on this journey?

Peter Landsman: I went right back to work on the tram Sunday morning. Some of my coworkers saw the airport party on social media and congratulated me, but it was right back to the normal lift operating scene. At Jackson Hole, we’ve got summer mountain biking, hiking, sightseeing
it’s busy!

Can you tell us about the origins of LiftBlog and what inspired you to start it?

Since I began skiing at Snoqualmie Pass at age 4, I’ve been interested in lifts. Each lift was painted in a different color, and I was fascinated by that. As a little kid, I started taking pictures of chairlifts as soon as I had a digital camera, and I built a catalog of images. In college in New England, I visited many resorts in Maine and New Hampshire. After college, I moved to Jackson on a whim and started as a seasonal lift operator. The LiftBlog project grew out of off-season boredom in 2014 when I needed something to do with a few weeks off. I made a website and thought maybe others would be interested in the pictures I was taking.

What is your motivation?

It is certainly not fame or fortune! I personally find skiing and chairlifts to be fascinating and I find it satisfying to share my interests with other people who also find it interesting. I’m blown away by how many people read LiftBlog, a few thousand people per day!

Who uses LiftBlog and why is it such an invaluable resource?

It’s two main groups: ski industry people who work for lift companies or at ski resorts use it for historical reference, to answer repair questions, or to see what other resorts are doing. Then there are skiers who are passionate about skiing. Even those who aren’t necessarily lift nerds like to see what’s going on in the industry.

What site visit has been the strangest or most curious?

In Alaska, at Mount Eyak, there is one of the original single chairs built in the 1930s. It’s the only lift of that vintage still operating in North America. Most “older” lifts nowadays are from the 60s or 70s.

Do you have a favorite lift?

Whistler’s PEAK 2 PEAK Gondola because it suspends large, 28-passenger aerial tram cabins on a detachable ropeway system. It’s efficient, can run in high winds, and is suspended 1,400 feet in the air between two mountains. Due to the expense, there’s no way this lift would be built in this day and age.

Do you have a favorite lift in each region?

• Northeast: Slide Brook Express at Sugarbush, VT
• Midwest: The Gondola at Lutsen Mountains, MN
• Rockies: Jackson Hole Tram in Jackson, WY
• Northern Rockies: The Silver Mountain Gondola in Kellogg, ID
• Pacific Northwest: Northway at Crystal, WA
• South: The Arizona Gondola at Snowbowl in Flagstaff, AZ
• California: Chair 23 at Mammoth, CA

What does skiing mean to you?

I was very lucky, as neither of my parents grew up skiing. They learned later in life and fell in love with it, sharing it with their kids. We skied on the weekends, mostly at Crystal Mountain in Washington, and traveled around the state to ski. Skiing is freedom. It allows me to get outside, see beautiful places, spend time in the mountains, and also check out these really cool machines full of technology that just happen to be in very wild places. I enjoy skiing every day at work at Jackson Hole and riding all the lifts to supervise them.

What’s next?

LiftBlog was only caught up for four days before the LEGOLAND New York Resort theme park debuted a new gondola last week. So, naturally, I’ll be visiting LEGOLAND next week to document the Minifigure Skyflyer with its seven custom-themed cabins. There are about 50 new lifts under construction this summer, so I’m looking forward to a busy winter.

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When the Kemmerer family bought Jackson Hole Mountain Resort in 1992 from original founders Paul McCollister and Alex Morley, they embarked on a 30-plus year journey that brought over $300 million worth of upgrades to the Wyoming resort. They replaced the tram, added the Bridger Gondola, and helped to create Jackson Hole Air, the small airline that offers over a dozen direct flights to the local airport, in addition to many, many other accomplishments. Needless to say, it’s been a productive tenure.

On August 3, the Kemmerers announced plans to sell Jackson Hole Mountain Resort by the end of the 2023 calendar year. The prospective new owners are a pair of local skiers and businessmen, along with their families, who plan to take the ski resort into its next phase.

One of the incoming co-owners is Eric Macy, who has been a member of the JHMR board of directors since 2014. Macy has a background in finance and growing and stabilizing both private and public companies, and has lived in Jackson full-time since 2007, where he has founded and run several businesses.

The other new co-owner is Mike Corbat, who also sits on the resort’s board of directors—he joined in 2021 after a 38-year stint as CEO of Citigroup. Corbat and his wife live in Jackson, and he’s a fly fisherman and golfer in addition to skier.

“Mike and I are honored to have the opportunity to carry on the legacy of this world-class ski resort,” Macy said in a press release. “We appreciate all the hardworking employees and members of the Jackson Hole community who have played an integral part in building JHMR into the ski mountain we know and love today. It is our privilege to continue cultivating an authentic resort experience that is treasured by locals and visitors alike. We look forward to many amazing winter and summer seasons to come.”

The sale is expected to close by the end of the year, and the purchase price has not been shared. Macy and Corbat aren’t planning any major changes to business operations at this time, and they will have Jay Kemmerer on hand to help with the transition. After the last season, the last lift to upgrade is the Sublette chairlift. Other than that, the new owners plan to continue to invest in “resort improvements, employees, and the community while maintaining JHMR’s world-class reputation.”

“Jackson Hole Mountain Resort’s legendary runs, couloirs and iconic features have provided the quintessential ski mountain experience for decades,” reads a statement from Corbat. “Coupled with an enthusiastic skier base and a dedicated community, JHMR defines what it means to be a best-in-class ski resort. We will work hard to preserve the cherished aspects of the ski mountain and continue building on the mountain’s storied tradition.”

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Confession time: I sometimes spend hours scouring the internet for videos of avalanches. Nature is badass, and there’s something about watching snow and ice . Of course these clips also make me feel sheer terror for the person filming, since many of them are captured by backcountry users who got . Let me tell you, there are a lot of these clips on the web.

A new scary avalanche video entered the oeuvre this week—luckily nobody died—and it provides one of the clearest viewpoints of what it’s like to be caught in one. And boy, does it look horrifying.

The footage belongs , a big-mountain skier from Jackson, Wyoming, who is known for off of cliffs in the Tetons. Leeper was skiing in the backcountry near Jackson Hole Mountain Resort on February 11 when he triggered the slide at the top of a narrow couloir. He was wearing a helmet camera at the time, and conditions were utterly bluebird. His device caught the ordeal in crisp high definition.

You can watch it below.

Leeper was skiing into the gulley when the snow crumbled beneath his skis. He was not buried by the debris, and instead rode on top of the avalanche as it careened downhill. Unfortunately, the gulley becomes narrower at lower elevation, and Leeper struck two rock walls at high speed. He suffered a dislocated shoulder and required an airlift from the local search and rescue team.

I phoned Leeper this week to hear about the incident. He told me he still remembers the thought that went through is mind when he felt the snow slough away under his skis. “I remember thinking ‘this is going to break me really bad,’” Leeper told me. “I really thought I was going to wake up in the hospital.”

Leeper had scoped the couloir several times before his run, and he had even aborted a previous descent because the snow coverage was low—he boot packed out at the midpoint. He wasn’t scared of an avalanche, he told me, because of the recent days of sunshine and warmer temperatures in the area. Indeed, the rates the current danger level as moderate (two out of five).

“The snow had a few days to settle with blue skies, and I wasn’t worried about wet slides. I was more concerned about the rocks in the middle,” he said. “I was skiing into it very cautiously. I knew exactly what I needed to do for the descent. I just wasn’t ready for the avalanche part of it.”

It was the first time Leeper had been trapped by an avalanche, and he was amazed by the speed at which it began, and by how quickly he went from feeling in control to being utterly powerless. The entire slide lasted just 18 seconds, but Leeper says it felt much longer.

“I remember sliding down the chute and hitting the first rock with my skies, and that launched me into the other rock,” he said. “I put up my hands to protect my face from slamming it, and as soon as I did that I felt the pain in my arm.”

Leeper came to rest in the couloir shortly after striking the wall. He immediately knew that his shoulder was badly dislocated, and the pain from the injury surged through his arm and shoulder. But he knew the outcome could have been worse. He stopped sliding just before reaching another band of sharp rocks, which would have done more damage to his body.

Leeper uploaded footage of the ordeal on February 14 In the three days since he published it, the clip has more than 1 million views.

I’ve watched the clip a dozen times at this point, and each time the dizzying footage leaves me with an elevated heart rate and an anxious feeling. You can see the snow go from solid to almost liquid in a matter of seconds, and then behave like a raging river descending a waterfall.

Leeper’s ski season is likely over, as he will require surgery to fix the shoulder, and does not yet know how long the recovery time will be. He’s has been skiing professionally for the past five years, and doing the sport at a high level for decades. He said he realizes that the video may turn some skiers away from charging big lines in the backcountry—which, he said, may be a positive development. This is the worst accident he’s ever had.

“Even looking back on it, I don’t regret skiing it,” he says. “I ski gnarly lines—it’s what I do. There’s no way to remove all of the risk, and sometimes it all catches up with you, no matter how careful you are.”

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How to make a day on the slopes even more perfect? Pair it with a wintry festival, and let the fun continue long after aprĂšs. From beer events to wine fĂȘtes and pretty much everything in between, these celebrations will fill your cup (and plate). Plus, you might nab a few celebrity chefs’ autographs along the way.

Check back. We’ll update this list if dates change or new information arises.

Taos Winter Wine Festival, Taos Ski Valley, New Mexico

January 26-29, 2023

The 35th Annual is a three-day weekend highlighting Taos’ culinary artistry and wines from around the world. Look for a reserve tasting, chef luncheons, aprùs-ski tastings, wine dinners, and more.

Beaver Creek’s Winter Culinary Weekend, Beaver Creek, Colorado

February 2-5, 2023

The of food and wine will celebrate Beaver Creek’s many luxurious culinary experiences with cooking demos, innovative wine and spirits events, and gourmet wine-pairing dinners.

Jackson Hole Food and Wine Winter Fest, Jackson Hole, Wyoming

March 2-4, 2023

As if a three-day trip to Jackson wasn’t already magical, with the you can add a caviar-and-champagne tasting, a grand tasting, wine dinners, and cooking classes to your ski day lineup.

Taste of Vail, Vail, Colorado

April 5-8, 2023

Seminars, wine tastings, and aprùs sip sessions populate the long weekend but the banner event—The Mountain Top Picnic—is legendary. Take the gondola up or ski over to Eagle’s Nest, and taste to your heart’s content.

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As a Black woman with a complicated upbringing, the mountains of northwest Wyoming weren’t an obvious place for me to find a home. My childhood was a short-lived one—I moved roughly 13 times before I was 13, and what I experienced during those years is an example of the disproportionate rates of abuse and risk that Black and brown children bear in this country and around the world. Still, I was lucky. The hand I was dealt held an exit in the form of well-off grandparents who were willing to raise a troubled teenager. They lived in Jackson, Wyoming, and introduced me to my first mountains, the Teton Range. It was safe and beautiful there; I didn’t want to be anywhere else. Like the moon interlocked with the tide, the pull of mountain living has drawn me in ever since—I drift off and to the high country I return, no matter the days or distance. The mountains and the iconic communities that rest among them are restorative for me.

Trust me when I say I know we have it good here, like really good.

Yet, I’ve noticed that the beauty and glory around us is about all that we are allowed to discuss in mountain towns. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard a guide or passerby say something along the lines of, “Just another day in paradise!” This attitude shows up on bumper stickers and in hashtags on social media with phrases like “Good Vibes Only” or “No Bad Days.” There is a sense that someone must suffer from a character flaw if they draw attention to the cracks in these bastions of pleasure. We have it so good in these idyllic landscapes that we shouldn’t take away from it by bringing up “unsavory” topics, right?

This attitude leaves us blind to real issues that plague mountain towns and the areas surrounding them, just as much as anywhere else. Like, for example, racism—if you are a person of color living in the Mountain West, you encounter signals daily that you don’t belong. In the rural areas surrounding Jackson, I’ll regularly pass confederate flags and dog whistles in the form of heavily wrapped militia trucks and bumper stickers. On occasion a friend will be in the car and we’ll laugh it off. ButÌęI feel incredibly vulnerable, like a snowshoe hare donning the wrong seasonal camouflage. It’s especially lonely to confront these racially charged symbols in communities that supposedly want to be allies but seem too uncomfortable to acknowledge this kind of racism exists all around us.

Years ago, I found myself in an informal conversation with the mayor of a nearby town. He asked me, in front of a group of colleagues, “How’d you get your hair like that? You stick your head outside of a window like a dog?” Immediately my cheeks flushed, while the chuckles of my colleagues filled the awkward silence. They must have known how inappropriate that comment was, but they clearly felt too uncomfortable to call it out and embarrass a public official. Often my reaction in moments like these is sheer blank surprise. And then I’m not sure what to do. If I react with rage, I’m irrationally angry. If I let it slide, I’m complicit in the subtle “othering” that perpetuates the roots of racism. But here’s the thing: these are unfair expectations to place on myself. I’m not alone here. What if my colleagues didn’t laugh along with the mayor? What if the next time someone says something like this, it wasn’t up to me to call it out? What if, as unpleasant as it might be, we didn’t pretend that it was fine, and that someone didn’t just say something wildly harmful?

We in the outdoor community are so good at pursuing physical discomfort in the mountains but struggle with the emotional discomfort required for essential conversations about hard topics. When everything is so blissful, we become less civically engaged, oblivious even, to addressing issues like racism.

It is not an accident that mountain towns reflect particular demographics—redlining, , and predatory and exclusionary lending practices have kept land, property, and generational wealth from solidifying in Black and brown hands. Not only are mountain towns very white—my own community of Jackson is 88.9 percent white—but they tend to have an incredible amount of economic inequality. When you benefit from these systems it’s easy to not think about them.

Ta-Nehisi Coates wrote about “white freedom” in a 2018 essay that eerily reflects the attitude of many who live in white mountain towns: “Freedom without consequence, freedom without criticism
a Stand Your Ground freedom, freedom without responsibility, without hard memory
a Confederate freedom, the freedom of John C. Calhoun, not the freedom of Harriet Tubman, which calls you to risk your own.” When you hear something offensive and walk the other way instead of calling it out, it is worth questioning whether that choice is enabled by an unhealthy kind of freedom.

Many people in mountain towns might say they stand against racism but want to believe it’s not something that exists where they live. I’ve lived in the Mountain West for close to 20 years now, and I’m telling you I’ve never felt more unsafe in my lifetime than I do now. It’s all around our liberal mountain bastions. In the kitchen of a diner in a remote stop in Utah, I see a young white man wearing a Trump hat and a shirt glorifying assault weapons. In Dillon, Montana, a place I’ve passed through many times through the years, there is a motel called the Sun Downer. Still, signals of rising extremism across the West are often met with silence—it’s much easier to focus on the positives.

And while this inability to talk about challenging topics disproportionately harms Black, brown, and Indigenous people, it can also be harmful to people experiencing other difficult-to-talk-about struggles, like mental illness. Mountain towns are experiencing a public health crisis when it comes to mental health. According to the CDC, are in the West. Wyoming is currently ranked number one. When we don’t discuss topics like depression or anxiety, it make the crisis worse and those suffering even more isolated.

What is the solution? We need to start by having real conversations that lead to real action. Call in your community and speak up when you encounter someone saying something insensitive even if you would deem it merely tone-deaf. When you ignore such comments, you signal to that person and others that such behavior is acceptable. And for the love of all things sacred, stop obsessing about getting it right. Lean into these messy conversations.

During the summer of 2020, as protests and indignation erupted across the country, it seemed to me the first time that people in my community began to acknowledge my Blackness, and what that may imply about my lived experience. Texts, Instagram messages, and phone calls poured into my channels apologizing for ancestral and present trauma and seeking my insight into the current state of racism in Jackson. But that was two years ago now, and hundreds of Black and brown bodies at the hands of public servants. In the summer of 2020, nearly every organization was putting out anti-racism messages and promoting the importance of inclusion; in the summer of 2022, the hysterics around Critical Race Theory have scared organizations into a void of silence. We are back to living in a sea of what goes unsaid.

That moment of “awakening” can be neither brief nor temporary. Yes, let us remove old monuments and . But these murals are no stand-in for the real work that must be done. Just as it takes the body some time to adapt to the physicality and stress that moving in the mountains demands, so too do these times require consistency and determination to overcome the legacies of implicit and systemic injustice. Each of us needs to actively shake ourselves out of the paradigms of living that leave us indifferent, apathetic, and complicit.

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A few years ago, —a professional dancer and skier—was dancing with her father at a cowboy bar in Jackson, Wyoming, where their footwork got a little too fancy for the venue. Once they started busting out inverted dance moves, with a dancer upside down, feet in the air, the bouncer promptly kicked them out, saying, “No boots over the brim!”ÌęEngerbretson was inspired.

In her new film, Boots Over Brim, from and , Engerbretson melds her two loves, western dancing and skiing, with the music of providing the beat for it all. Maybe dancing and skiing aren’t so different after all.

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Once upon a time, there was a magical town named Crested Butte. It was nestled in a valley in southwest Colorado among beautiful, towering peaks and shivering aspen groves. The mountains made the town difficult to get to—it lay, quite literally, at the end of a two-lane road. There were a couple of dirt roads in, too, but after the late-fall snowstorms, they became impassable. And so the mountains protected the town.

For a long time things were good. In the winter, there was powder to ski; in the summer, there were trails to ride. Most important, there were not so many visitors, at least compared to other mountain towns. Crested Butte was far from the constant roar and snaking brake lights of I-70, Denver’s thoroughfare to the mountains; and some might also say the family who owned the ski resort did a pretty crappyÌęjob of marketing it. But the residentsÌęliked it this way. Their town had not sold its soul for tourist dollars and high-speed lifts like Aspen or Vail. They still had their T-bars, their funky culture, their cruiser bikes parked unlocked on the streets.

ButÌęthings began to change. Crested Butte was discovered, in the same way that other magical towns were being discovered. More people began to visit, and those people told their friends and posted glowy photos on Instagram. More people bought second homes there, driving up the price of real estate. Then came the Airbnbs and the VRBOs, which allowed second-home owners to earn a lot more money renting to tourists than to the people who actually lived and worked there. The locals found it harder and harder to afford a place to rent or buy in town. They began to leave, moving 35 minutes downvalleyÌęto Gunnison or disappearing from the area altogether. By 2017, some wondered if Airbnb was going to kill this, and other, magical towns.

Then came the pandemic. Maybe this part of the story you know. Unchained from their desks, the hordes of newly remote white-collar workers descended upon all the magical mountain towns, and in just one year, the median list price for a home in Crested Butte jumped 40 percent, to $895,000. Rents soared, too—20 to 40 percent in Colorado ski towns like Crested Butte, according to one . Meanwhile, both for-sale and rental inventory plummeted. Now it was nearly impossible for locals to find housing.

And one day in the summer of 2021, the town simply stopped working. Restaurants began to shut down for parts of the day or entire days of the week. “Help Wanted” signs appeared up and down the main street of Elk Avenue. It didn’t matter that the sidewalks teemed with tourists freed from COVID lockdowns and ready to spend. Lines grew. People waited an hour and a half, two hours for food. What’s happening? visitors grumped.

The newspapers reported on the problem: it was so hard to find affordable housing in town that there weren’t enough people left to work in town. It wasn’t just Crested Butte, either. The headlines popped up all summer long:

In July, NPR shone its spotlight on Crested Butte: ÌęIndeed, by that point the valley’s tourism association was running ads in the local paper informing visitors about the housing shortage and asking them to be patient with slower than usual service. The window of the iconic Wooden Nickel steakhouse displayed an “Employee Crisis Limited Menu” notice. The sign went on to explain that, on top of having “barely enough employees to run the restaurant,” some cooks had just quit. “We’re sorry we’re unable to provide the menu you expected,” it told would-be diners. “Thank you for joining us on this challenging evening.” Across the street, at the Brick Oven Pizzeria, someone had affixed a sticker on the wall of the men’s bathroom that read, simply, “SAVE CB.”

The magical town, it seemed, was in serious trouble.

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I walked over to the Stagecoach Bar for lunch last week, a local favorite at the bottom of Teton Pass, only to discover a sign on the door: “Sorry, closed until 5 p.m. due to lack of staffing.”

At first glance it seemed surprising. The town of Jackson is as busy as it’s ever been, with already reported in May and June. Coffee shop lines stretch out the door, trailheads fill up before 8 a.m. in Grand Teton National Park, and driving the eight miles from Jackson to Wilson now takes up to 40 minutes instead of the usual 10. But although the town is bustling, local shops and restaurants are being forced to reduce hours or close for the simple reason that they have no one to staff them.

“A lot of our staff has lost their rentals and no one can move here because of the housing shortage,” says Josh Hirschmann, General Manager of , who recently announced they’d be closed on the weekends to protect the mental health of their already overworked staff. “There are people I know with the skillsets we need but we can’t hire them because they can’t find a place to live.”

Flipping through the classifieds in the Jackson Hole Daily last week, I found 10 pages of Help Wanted inquiries with 183 job postings followed by only three long-term rentals, one of which was a one-bedroom condo in town for $3,500 per month. “I can’t get anyone to bus tables because you need to be making a ridiculous amount of money to live here,” Hirschmann adds.

The housing crisis isn’t a new issue for ski towns like Jackson, Aspen, and Crested Butte, where the local workforce has been struggling with an expensive, unstable, and competitive housing market for decades. “The last year homes were affordable to the local workforce in Jackson, meaning the median home sale correlated to the median earning household, was 1987,” says April Norton, Teton County Housing Director. “But people are starting to hit their breaking point.”

It’s not uncommon to move every few months, pay $1,500 for a windowless basement room, spend the summer in a Subaru Outback, or share a motel room for the winter. My neighbors in my last apartment complex had a family of four crammed into a 450-square-foot studio. People will do whatever it takes to survive in this town, but now that restaurants, bars, libraries, bike shops, and even the public pool are starting to close or reduce hours, the crisis is finally drawing attention from those who only follow the market loosely.

For many Americans pre-pandemic, jobs were the only thing keeping them in places like New York, L.A., or San Francisco. Mountain towns have seen a huge influx in both visitors and new residents since the COVID-19 outbreak as digital nomads with deep pockets for monthly rent flee the city in favor of fresh mountain air.

“Condos that were selling for $300,000 two years ago are going for $700,000. That kind of appreciation is just phenomenal.” says Norton, who added that in the last year, rent rates have gone up 10 percent, houses have gone up 22 to 40 percent, and wages have only gone up 4 percent. “It’s challenging to work with families here who have good jobs and have saved up money over the years, only to be outbid by cash buyers from outside the valley, sight unseen.”

It’s easy to point fingers at the big-city refugees who are willing to pay double the cost of what an apartment should be, but the surge in demand for housing this past year is bringing to the surface a problem that has plagued these mountain towns for decades: not enough affordable housing.

Crested Butte declared a Housing Disaster Emergency in June, stating that “the current lack of available, affordable workforce housing is threatening the livelihood and character of the town, its citizens, and its businesses.” Similar to Jackson, local businesses in Crested Butte are spread too thin, unable to staff restaurants and bike shops for the summer. The town authorized tent camping and mobile homes in residentially zoned private properties, an emergency protocol to buy a little bit of time, but by no means a real fix.

Aspen has long struggled with a competitive housing market, but is ahead of the mountain town curve when it comes to affordable housing projects. Aspen Ski Co.’s most recent project, , opened Memorial Day with 35 units for Ski Co. employees and eight units for non-Ski Co. employees who are local licensed childcare workers. According to Aspen Ski Co., the town of Aspen has offered the largest affordable housing program per capita in the United States for the past 45 years, with roughly 3,000 employee units set aside in a town that has about 7,500 full-time residents.

Norton is hopeful about upcoming projects in Jackson, with 350 deed-restricted units in the pipeline, on top of the 1,230 units already in the valley. But there’s still a long way to go.

“I’m really worried about what’s going to happen to our community because of this,” says Hirschmann. “We need to find a way to keep the ski bum. That’s the heart of Jackson. If we lose the skid, we not only lose our workforce, but we lose our culture.”

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It’s been a hard year for everyone. This summer, how about we let the kids pretend like everything is OK in the world? These getaway spots offer perks for the grownups, like mountain bike trails, surf breaks, and rooftop bars, as well as the drive-in movie theaters, hot-springs-fed pools, and skate parks that will keep the kids happy.Ìę

Escalante, Utah

is paradise for young explorers.ÌęThey can wander among slot canyons, gape at sandstone arches and natural bridges, and dig for dinosaur fossils. If your kids can handle a six-mile round-trip hike, it’s worth the trek toÌę, which drops 130 feet into a pool below. Take a drive onÌę to explore hoodoos inÌę or hike the family-friendlyÌę slot canyons. The reward: burgers and shakes atÌę in the town of Escalante afterward.Ìę (RV sites from $69; cabins from $249) opened this year on the grounds of an old drive-in movie theater and has custom-designed A-frame cabins, vintage Airstreams, and RV sites. You can watch an outdoor movie from the seat of a restored classic car.ÌęÌę

Ouray, Colorado

This high-altitude town is famous for its ice climbing in the winter, but Ouray is gorgeous in the summer, too. A newÌę—a European-style cable climbing route—opened here in 2020, crossing the Uncompahgre Gorge via a 35-foot-long cable wire bridge.Ìę leads guided climbs (from $139) on the new routes, which are geared for all ages and abilities. The geothermally heated pools at make for a nice post-climbing activity. (from $105) openedÌęin 2020 in a historic building that was once a saloon and brothel and now has six rooms, a rooftop bar, and a wood-burning sauna.

Woodward, Pennsylvania

Admittedly, your kids are going to like this destination more than you, but there’s still a lot for adults to enjoy—from paddleboarding to hiking trails—atÌę, the premier action sports training facility in the U.S. Whether you’re coming for theÌę (from $200) or you’re signing your teen up for a skate or BMX camp, this place is all about fun. The 48-acre campus has skate parks, BMX race tracks, go-karts, a pool, and more. Families can stay at the Woodward Lodge (from $280) or pitch a tent at the nearby (from $30), a campground adjacent to one of the largest underground caverns in Pennsylvania (private cave tours available by reservation).

York, Maine

If you’re looking for a laid-back beach destination on the East Coast, head to this small town 45 miles south of Portland.ÌęTake a stroll on the one-mile Long Sands Beach or hike up 692-footÌę—the kids will enjoy it all, too. Afterward, take in the view ofÌę from Sohier Park and watch saltwater taffy get made at the , which has been making candy for over 100 years. Stay at the oceanfrontÌę (from $249), which is opening this summer in a restored motel property with a new heated pool, bungalows, and rooms that are decorated to celebrate the area’s long-standing surf culture.

Eureka, California

This Northern California coastal townÌęis home to some of the world’s tallest trees, the towering redwoods of Humboldt County. The coolest new way to see those trees? From 100 feet above the forest floor on theÌę, a suspended, self-guided walkway opening in early June amongÌę60 acres of old-growth and second-growth redwoods in the city’s beloved Sequoia Park Zoo. Book a suite at theÌę (from $166), and enjoy itsÌęlawn games, hot tubs, and beach access. Your kids are going to love roasting marshmallows at the fire pits and taking a bath after the beach in the outdoor clawfoot tubs that are part of the property’s historic bathhouse.

Sister Bay, Wisconsin

Door County, the peninsula that juts into Lake Michigan from eastern Wisconsin, hasÌę300 miles of shoreline, dozens of surrounding islands, and a culture that celebrates its Scandinavian heritage. Don’t missÌę, a designated Dark Sky Park with hike-in campsites, 30 miles of trails, and excellent stargazing. The kids will dig theÌę to Washington Island and a movie at theÌę, which opens for the summer season in May. This four-bedroom, mid-centuryÌę (from $399), newly listed for this summer via Airbnb, will house the whole family.

Jackson, Wyoming

By midsummer, the town of Jackson and its neighboringÌę andÌę will be busy. But Memorial Day into early June is still early for the summer crowds.Ìę (from $549)—named after the Cloudveil Dome in the Teton Range—is a new hotel in the town square that’s opening on May 26. The kids will enjoy the outdoor pool, but you’ll love the rooftop terrace and in-house bar and restaurant. Hotel staff can help curate itineraries for the whole family, ranging from fly-fishing or rafting on the Snake River to guided mountain biking and hiking. Or head toÌę for hiking and biking trails for you; alpine slide and ziplines for them.

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