Rolling out the white carpet

Dec. 8—Grab your poles and gloves and get your cold-weather gear ready.

It's officially ski season in New Mexico.

Thanksgiving and the first big snowstorm of the season have come and gone, and five of the state's eight ski areas have already opened their slopes.

Ski Santa Fe opened up over the holiday weekend, and Mother Nature cooperated by dropping nine inches of snow on its trails.

Only two of the state's ski areas — Angel Fire Resort and Pajarito Mountain — plan for an opening in mid-to-late December.

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For more information about New Mexico's various ski resorts, you can visit skinewmexico.com. If you're looking for ticket prices and snow reports for Ski Santa Fe, you can access them at skisantafe.com. Information about Wolf Creek Ski Area can be found at wolfcreekski.com.

In addition to Ski Santa Fe, Ski Apache, Taos Ski Valley, Red River Ski & Summer Area, and Sipapu Ski & Summer Resort opened in November.

"People don't realize that we're part of the Rockies too," says Jack Dant, mountain manager at Ski Santa Fe. "For the comparative amount of mountains that we have, we've got some great ski areas in New Mexico. We're typically not as crowded as the front-range areas. One thing we've done is not join these big ski pass groups; that keeps our traffic more localized."

Dant, a New Mexico native, has been working at Ski Santa Fe since 2002, and he says the slopes employ between 375 and 425 people in a variety of roles ranging from parking and lift crews to snowmaking and trail grooming.

"I came for the pass, and I stayed for the career," he says.

This year, Dant says, Ski Santa Fe has improved its visitor experience by adding a new ticketing system that includes RFID gates and a direct-to-lift option. Ski Santa Fe had opened five of its seven lifts and 22 of its 89 trails at press time, and Dant says the season typically ramps up around Christmas and lasts all the way until April. Ski Santa Fe's Platinum Pass, which includes no blackout days and direct-to-lift options, costs $879 for the season. Ski Santa Fe also sells weekend half-day ($84) and full-day ($105) passes.

"We tried to be very reasonable in terms of comparing what we were doing with other ski areas in the region," says Dant of the modest ticket increases. "All our costs have increased, but we were able to keep our ticket prices with a less than $10 increase on our day ticket price."

If things are still ramping up in New Mexico, they're already in full swing at Wolf Creek Ski Area in Pagosa Springs, Colorado.

Ninety percent of Wolf Creek's 960 skiable acres were open as of press time, and the resort already has had 55 inches of snow dropped on it.

"We always say we try to get things rolling on the first Friday in November. But sometimes we have even opened on Halloween," says Rosanne Haidorfer-Pitcher, the vice president of marketing and sales for Wolf Creek Ski Area. "We're known for our early openings on natural snow. We do make snow in that beginner area so we can start with lessons right away."

Wolf Creek added a new chairlift this season, The Tumbler, that was built to give beginning skiers a relaxed learning environment of their own. The ski area added RFID ticketing in 2022, and now tickets can be printed on-site at the Base Camp Building. The Wolf Creek SuperSaver Season Pass costs $974, and the Peak Advantage Season Pass costs $1,297. Day passes range from $89 in regular rates to $100 in peak season.

Haidorfer-Pitcher says that Wolf Creek currently gets more than 400 inches of snow per year, and before the ski area opened, skiing was just a way of life.

The ski area began in 1938 with a humble Chevy truck used to tow skiers to the top of the trail, and it's developed into a huge industry over time.

"People were using skis to deliver the mail and just to get around," says Haidorfer-Pitcher. "Wolf Creek grew organically. It wasn't like some places where they put in the villages and the trails and the lifts all at one time.

"We've been around for a while and have slowly been getting busier and busier and with COVID, all of a sudden, mountain towns just kind of exploded with people wanting to spend more time outside."