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Learned how to ski here when I was a child. Much later in life, I explored the area in the summer. Then, later on, I did a couple ski tours on my splitboard on the hills behind it using this area to access them.

I grew up skiing White Track (not plural). It was a great little hill to learn on. Myself and my buddies would all get season passes and be out there 2-3 times a week. It was a great way to pass the cold winters. Thanks for capturing these old places, lots of great memories were had at all of them I'm sure.

Pretty sure the forest service made a terrible call on this one. Nearly everything in Tahoe (in which I'll lump Kirkwood, because the point still stands) is super expensive and overcrowded. And on days when the Carson Spur (a section of the highway between this place and Kirkwood) closes down, you've got crowds of people who either have to wait it out or give up and turn around. Meanwhile, literally hundreds of people use Iron Mountain as a winter recreation area on the weekends, which costs either $15/day or $40/season per car, and that's just to go goof around. The place can get packed!

Really feel like these areas could be profitable now

I really enjoyed snowboarding up there back in my ski touing days. Absolutely beautiful place

The biggest issue for Forbidden was dealing with melt water taking snow away too quickly each season. Did try using pallets by the lodge...

The school from Cassiar was moved to Hudson Hope BC and is still in use

Everything about ski areas: If you don't get paid up front, you're not getting paid at all.

Great video! Some more info on grizzly ridge from memory of growing up in slave: Snow was often good, but there were some bad years. On good years you could see the runs with snow still on them well into spring, from the highway near the beach turnoff The final stretch of the road to the hill was always an issue, and cost a lot to maintain. I think that was one of the main factors for closing but i could be wrong There were also lots of xc ski trails in the same area I feel like it closed in the early 2000's, not 90's Well after it closed, 2 mountain bikers were attacked by a grizzly bear and sheltered in the remnants of the chalet until the bear left

Minor point of correction - Maichen is pronounced, "May shen". Past that, the memory of Cassiar still lives on with us in Maichen, though it was just before my time - i was in Elementary School in Watson when the town passed.

Lift tickets were $4

Tons of good childhood memories from there!

I skied there as a child, many weeknights and every weekend. The later expansion was too ambitious. It was hardly used and not good terrain.

Grew up skiing at this place. Kept hoping they'd re-open, as it's fairly close to my parents and i would love to get back there as an adult and re-experience it. Too bad they finally gave up.

Great video. I can’t believe in all those years no snowmaking was installed. Definitely a huge reason why they made no money. I could imagine that a lot of employees and investors felt ripped off and I’m sure one of them set the restaurant on fire. Too bad a legit owner never owned it. Owning a ski resort takes the right individual to make it happen.

"More sustainable way?" I can't stand loopy leftists.

Thinking of going boarding there and using snowmobile to go up

These videos make me so grateful that people are willing to undertake the daunting and risky task of opening and running a ski resort. Thank God there are people willing to do it, it clearly is difficult and complex.

It seems Silver Summit will unfortunately be added to this list

We skied Ski Rio many years back, in the late 80's and early 90's. There are many factors that work against the mountain reopening, even if the infrastructure is brought up to date. Diesel generators were user to provide power to the entire mountain, including a few residential properties, water wells, and shared telephone lines. Issues beyond management's control include: 1) Weather: Current trends predict smaller and fewer storms. 2) Topography: Most of the mountain is open, meaning longer exposure to the sun, and few slopes are north facing, meaning snow cover is not retained for longer periods. 3) Topography: Lower peak elevation mean lower precipitation is drawn off infrequent storms. 4) Taos region ski areas are easier to get to from existing communities that provide services such as housing, food, gas, historic sights, etc. 5) Geography: Distance required to travel from Alamosa and Taos require longer travel time and gas. 6) Cost: Ski Rio (or whatever the ski area would be called) would have to be cost competitive by a significant amount to make it worthwhile for skiers to put up with drive time and lack of services. Geography, land availability, & cost also make it unrealistic that a road could be built to cut the distance/time issues. There are likely other practical factors that come into play!

Thanks for doing this one. I skied there multiple times in the late 80’s. Always had a good time and there were never any lift lines. I remember the water going out at the hotel one of the times I went. Place always seemed like it had a lot of potential but you had to drive through Red River if coming from OK/TX and through Taos if coming from the south, which probably didn’t help.

My brother loved going there back in the day. 👍👍👍

skied here in 93 while we were at taos for the winter. thanks for the history

more midwest resorts please there are so many!

my grandfather had told me about this mountain and said it was quite a nice little spot to ski in

Can you do an episode on Stagecoach resort near steamboat springs?

Merry Christmas ❤❤

Will it ever become a ski destination again? Seems like great terrain and vibe?

This is an absolutely fantastic piece of work. Keep up the great work!

Man, nice job on this one!! Crazy lawsuits and bleeding of money. The 20% interest rates in the early 80s were tough. The bonds probably went for 11 or 12%, I would guess. Any time you have multiple players on both ends of transactions, you know the fraud is abundant!!

I bet it is very interesting but I couldnt listen due to the horrific elevator music. It looks well researched so Cheers to you! I will catch the next one.

In 1984-85 I along with Kim Miller (the current ceo of Scarpa) were partners in Telemark Ski Guides at Berthoud Pass. We provided telemark, and alpine touring lessons and did guided trips to Current Creek and occasionally along the divide down to Winter Park. I had some of the best backcountry skiing in my life there.

Wow incredible!!!!

A new video? I'm in.

If the access road had come from the south it could have drawn from Santa Fe and Albuquerque, the only population centers in the region. But the road came from the north and there is nothing up that way. Also, no nearby airport to pull visits from Texas which is a big part of the New Mexico ski market. In short, inaccessible

Damn this place was cursed - so many owners and so much failed financing

Used to love Ski Rio when I lived in NM.

Free rio

So, about ten seconds before they mentioned a fire burned one of the lodges, I thought, "The next thing that is going to happen is the lodge will burn down"

bummer guy

This is quite a sad example of a ski resort not being properly financed and equipped with the right lifts from the very start. Those two factors doomed the place from the very start.

I grew up going to SKI RIO, it was such a fun mountain. Obviously as a kid I never knew all the stuff that was going on in the background, but such a shame because it was a family oriented, fun mountain and would be neat to see it come to life again.

should have added a lawsuit counter in the corner

LOVE how this turned out. Worth every minute of the wait!

A few final notes: 1. This video was painful to research, script and edit. For pacing reasons, I did not include everything that went down at Ski Rio. It just would have made this video too long and confusing. 2. Apologies for this video going out so late. This video ranks with the Lake Louise video for the most work put into a video (well over 100 hours for each). 3. Finally, thanks to SRG Skiing and the others for their contributions to this video!

I first skied here in 1979 when I was in high school. A full day lift ticket cost $7. I even managed to score some free tickets. The snow conditions were always wonderful. I have many memories of fantastic, deep powder with few people to share it with. The old double chairlift was a challenge to ride - if you were not careful it would painfully bang you on the back of the legs before you sat down. You had to sidestep up the steps before loading the lift (see @2:46). The offramp was narrow and steep. I don't recall the lift ever stopping - someone once told me that if it did stop you should jump off since the brake was not reliable (don't know if this is true or not). The lift-served part was fun but short. The Plunge was usually full of moguls and very challenging for those old 205's. What made this place special was all the backcountry terrain. The 90's area (Current Creek) has super steep, narrow and technical avalanche chutes (CDOT just numbered all the slide paths since there were so many) which, when open, always had powder to be found. You took Meadows to a glade area before encountering the chutes. It was the longest descent. Floral Park was also steep and despite its exposure it usually had great snow. I once skied it in waist-to-chest deep powder. For me, Hell's Half Acre was about the steep chutes. Chute 1 (North Chute on the map) is 47 degrees in pitch on the top. If you screw up, you fall off it before falling down. The snow conditions were some of the best I ever have skied in Colorado. The area is mostly below timberline which helps mitigate the fierce winds that blow across the summit. Plus, the clouds get stalled going over the Continental Divide which makes for deep, light snow. However, storm days were a challenge at times. The wind could be brutal. The people who skied here were so nice and friendly, like a big (happy) family. In the days before the bus setup the crowd was small and you could always run into people you knew. The first season they used busses was great. Very few people knew about the goods, so it was mostly uncrowded. The subsequent years saw increased crowds, and it became a battle to get a spot on the next bus. After once having my skis go up without me (put them in the rack on the back and then found out there was no space left and then the bus took off), and then growing weary of the long waits for the bus to get back up, I gave this place up in the early 1990's. There were never any lift lines but by then I craved the longer descents below the lifts. In the summer I hiked around this area a lot. Parking at the top there are lots of options. Once path leads to the Current Creek area where I once found lots of wild Boletus mushrooms. Continuing on you can go all the way into the Mary Jane ski area or fork off and go up Meadows to the summit of the old quad chair, then drop back down to the highway going along the Main Line run. Going up The Glide (the road on the east side) you can reach the Divide and then hike north as far as you want. The views to the east are breathtaking and you can see all the way to Denver. There is also good hiking in Pumphouse Basin. I am grateful for all the wonderful times I spent here.

where do you get the history? i want to see sunshines history

whered you get the history of the chair