Vail Stoke Thread... 2025!

[saltyant]

Looks like we got 8 inches last night at Vail. Maybe I'll ask someone to take a picture of me skiing the perder and then I'll put that photograph on a credit card. TIG JADIP WTGAI.

 

[GrilledSteezeSandwich]

16 minutes ago, saltyant said:

Looks like we got 8 inches last night at Vail. Maybe I'll ask someone to take a picture of me skiing the perder and then I'll put that photograph on a credit card. TIG JADIP WTGAI.

 

Nice view, did you bring your fishing rod???  How was your travel out there?  Have fun 

[saltyant]

7 minutes ago, GrilledSteezeSandwich said:

Nice view, did you bring your fishing rod???  How was your travel out there?  Have fun 

United bag check at Nork pissed me off. So I prepaid for 1 ski and 1 boot bag, and also opted to check my carry on for free. At the kiosk there was no option for printing 2 separate stickers for the ski and boot bags, so I ended up with 2 stickers but needed 3. I accidently put the carry on sticker on the ski boot bag. Then I went to the front desk and asked them to print an extra ticket and they said I had to go back to the kiosk. I said the kiosk doesn't provide an option but they said too bad. I asked them to check in my ski boot bag to get rid of that at least. So I go back to the kiosk and start over and a helper is there. I got 2 tickets printed but I was flustered so I misplaced one sticker. And the stickers said hockey equipment. So now I still needed one ticket. Fortunately my brah had an extra sticker because he prepaid for more than he needed so my ski bag was under my brah's name. Somehow by a Christmas miracle all my gear ended up at Vail and now it's radical.

[saltyant]

[GrilledSteezeSandwich]

1 hour ago, saltyant said:

United bag check at Nork pissed me off. So I prepaid for 1 ski and 1 boot bag, and also opted to check my carry on for free. At the kiosk there was no option for printing 2 separate stickers for the ski and boot bags, so I ended up with 2 stickers but needed 3. I accidently put the carry on sticker on the ski boot bag. Then I went to the front desk and asked them to print an extra ticket and they said I had to go back to the kiosk. I said the kiosk doesn't provide an option but they said too bad. I asked them to check in my ski boot bag to get rid of that at least. So I go back to the kiosk and start over and a helper is there. I got 2 tickets printed but I was flustered so I misplaced one sticker. And the stickers said hockey equipment. So now I still needed one ticket. Fortunately my brah had an extra sticker because he prepaid for more than he needed so my ski bag was under my brah's name. Somehow by a Christmas miracle all my gear ended up at Vail and now it's radical.

Oh Lordy you got yourself in a real pickle…if possible I always try to get the gate agent to do my bag tags as they suck…I’ve never checked a boot bag and never will, I don’t even have a boot bag, some of the boomers who boot up in the lodge have really schmancy boot bags..maybe Harold will show you his sometime. 
 

Did you fly to Eagle airport or Denver so you could visit the mint?

Edited Tuesday at 04:16 PM by GrilledSteezeSandwich

[saltyant]

3 hours ago, GrilledSteezeSandwich said:

Oh Lordy you got yourself in a real pickle…if possible I always try to get the gate agent to do my bag tags as they suck…I’ve never checked a boot bag and never will, I don’t even have a boot bag, some of the boomers who boot up in the lodge have really schmancy boot bags..maybe Harold will show you his sometime. 
 

Did you fly to Eagle airport or Denver so you could visit the mint?

I have an extra baggage tag now to practice. The agents weren't very helpful. Now a days it's a do it yourself. I decided to go the boot bag root because you can check two bags for the price of one. I don't boot up in the lodge, that's just a waste of time

Eagle airport. We opted for a direct flight from Nork which was really nice.

[enjoralas]

Southwest lost my skis in Denver en route to Steamboat. Well, not lost them, they just didn't make the connection, and when I checked with the service desk they looked it up and knew right where they were, so it was no big deal. I was worried for a minute because I left everyone else to get bags while I got the rental car, and then went out to check out the rental car since they didn't have my car type and I had to make sure it was big enough, and while I was doing that they all came out with all the bags except the skis, so for a bit no one was watching for them. Was worried someone walked off with my bag since there was another double bag left behind. Was actually relieved to find out they  never made the plane. 

There was another flight 4 hours later and they offered to deliver them to the condo, but since we had the rental car I drove back out to pick them up for a $250 voucher. Figured might as well.

[RidgeRacer]

57 minutes ago, enjoralas said:

Southwest lost my skis in Denver en route to Steamboat. Well, not lost them, they just didn't make the connection, and when I checked with the service desk they looked it up and knew right where they were, so it was no big deal. I was worried for a minute because I left everyone else to get bags while I got the rental car, and then went out to check out the rental car since they didn't have my car type and I had to make sure it was big enough, and while I was doing that they all came out with all the bags except the skis, so for a bit no one was watching for them. Was worried someone walked off with my bag since there was another double bag left behind. Was actually relieved to find out they  never made the plane. 

There was another flight 4 hours later and they offered to deliver them to the condo, but since we had the rental car I drove back out to pick them up for a $250 voucher. Figured might as well.

You drove from steamboat back to Denver?

[enjoralas]

37 minutes ago, RidgeRacer said:

You drove from steamboat back to Denver?

No, flew into Hayden, less than 30 min drive and we were gonna be out in town getting groceries anyway. The bag got left in Denver but SW put it on the next plane.

Wasn't going to rent a car since the bus and condo shuttles are so good there, but for 5 of us to get round trip airport shuttle was gonna be $585 plus tips to the drivers/bag slingers, and the car was $640 all in, so made sense.

If just Pops and I, we would have gotten a shuttle from the airport, and then I would have had them deliver them

 

Edited Tuesday at 10:06 PM by enjoralas

[RidgeRacer]

For $250 I would have done that too then

[GrilledSteezeSandwich]

31 minutes ago, RidgeRacer said:

For $250 I would have done that too then

@saltyant has the epic pass and he no longer gets carded for R rated movies so had to pay the adult price but he had radical skiing at Jackson Frost and Hunter mountain and Stowe and now Vail…and nice jacket salty for real..it’s prob real warm..sales on soft goods be hitting..this time of year but gotta put my Johnny cash on Blue pass soon..

[saltyant]

Some grate pictures with my brahs

[GrilledSteezeSandwich]

@saltyant the camara adds 10 pounds and your jacket adds 30 wahahaha…I’m jealous..wish I was out there..when you get back we can talk about flying me and your sister to Cancun..she can bring two friends 

[GrilledSteezeSandwich]

You eat anything good or talk to any babes?  I talked to some babes in Jackson hole but mostly were employees so they have to be nice lol

[saltyant]

9 hours ago, GrilledSteezeSandwich said:

You eat anything good or talk to any babes?  I talked to some babes in Jackson hole but mostly were employees so they have to be nice lol

I ate some grate Mexican food in Vail. It reminded me of home. I haven't talked to any babies during this ski trip.

[GrilledSteezeSandwich]

21 minutes ago, saltyant said:

I ate some grate Mexican food in Vail. It reminded me of home. I haven't talked to any babies during this ski trip.

What did you eat at the Mexican restaurant.  I bet there are alot of places on the mountain to eat lunch although you might bring pocket meat. 

[saltyant]

1 hour ago, GrilledSteezeSandwich said:

What did you eat at the Mexican restaurant.  I bet there are alot of places on the mountain to eat lunch although you might bring pocket meat. 

I ate a burrito on Sunday when we arrived. It was grate, it reminded me of my local cultural food in Northeast PA and lessened my homesickness. I just eat a big breakfast and skip lunch usually. Maybe I'll put a cereal bar in my pocket. My brahs put sandwiches in their pockets but I think that sounds terrible. I don't want to eat a mushy sloppy mess. If I bring a sandwich to work I pack the loaf of bread, mustard, and meat separately and then make the sandwich when it's time to eat so it's fresh. It would be a challenge to ski with a load of bread. 

Edited Wednesday at 02:30 PM by saltyant

[indiggio]

On 3/4/2025 at 10:01 AM, saltyant said:

United bag check at Nork pissed me off. So I prepaid for 1 ski and 1 boot bag, and also opted to check my carry on for free. At the kiosk there was no option for printing 2 separate stickers for the ski and boot bags, so I ended up with 2 stickers but needed 3. I accidently put the carry on sticker on the ski boot bag. Then I went to the front desk and asked them to print an extra ticket and they said I had to go back to the kiosk. I said the kiosk doesn't provide an option but they said too bad. I asked them to check in my ski boot bag to get rid of that at least. So I go back to the kiosk and start over and a helper is there. I got 2 tickets printed but I was flustered so I misplaced one sticker. And the stickers said hockey equipment. So now I still needed one ticket. Fortunately my brah had an extra sticker because he prepaid for more than he needed so my ski bag was under my brah's name. Somehow by a Christmas miracle all my gear ended up at Vail and now it's radical.

Here we go!
We ran into the same issue in Philly going out to Denver last week.
United baggage UI software royally sucks donkey dick!
There's no indication on the page that says you have to do anything special for ski and boot bags, so I just went on my merry way checking 1 bag, expecting it to ask me later whether they're skis/boot, but no.  It never asked and never printed out a second luggage ticket.   When I went to drop the bag off, they guy said there's an exception button at the bottom of the page.   Can you make it any LESS obvious?   He printed out a second bag ticket for boot bag.

On the way back we thought we had it figured out.   1 bag checked, pushed the exception button, no I don't want free check my carry on.  Kiosk starts flashing for attendant, probably for weight, as there's a scale right there).   Attendant comes over, scans badge, pushes some button and walks away.  One ticket gets printed!  WTF???  Fight through crowd to get attendant back to get second ticket printed.  How is this saving any time?  Absolutely stupid!

Get into Philly awaiting ski bag.   Carousel comes to stop, ask attendant, no more bags.   Slim & my ski bags nowhere to be found.  Get in line with like 20 others from flight who also didn't get their skis.   Go into office and attendant has a list of all our bags and checks off my name on the list, I see Slim's name there too.  WTF? 

Skis end up being delivered next day at 11pm.

Off to X to complain.  Got $40 luggage fee refunded.

Edited Wednesday at 03:14 PM by indiggio

[saltyant]

26 minutes ago, indiggio said:

Here we go!
We ran into the same issue in Philly going out to Denver last week.
United baggage UI software royally sucks donkey dick!
There's no indication on the page that says you have to do anything special for ski and boot bags, so I just went on my merry way checking 1 bag, expecting it to ask me later whether they're skis/boot, but no.  It never asked and never printed out a second luggage ticket.   When I went to drop the bag off, they guy said there's an exception button at the bottom of the page.   Can you make it any LESS obvious?   He printed out a second bag ticket for boot bag.

On the way back we thought we had it figured out.   1 bag checked, pushed the exception button, no I don't want free check my carry on.  Kiosk starts flashing for attendant, probably for weight, as there's a scale right there).   Attendant comes over, scans badge, pushes some button and walks away.  One ticket gets printed!  WTF???  Fight through crowd to get attendant back to get second ticket printed.  How is this saving any time?  Absolutely stupid!

Get into Philly awaiting ski bag.   Carousel comes to stop, ask attendant, no more bags.   Slim & my ski bags nowhere to be found.  Get in line with like 20 others from flight who also didn't get their skis.   Go into office and attendant has a list of all our bags and checks off my name on the list, I see Slim's name there too.  WTF? 

Skis end up being delivered next day at 11pm.

Off to X to complain.  Got $40 luggage fee refunded.

Thanks, I'm writing a procedure for next season and putting it in my ski boot bag so I don't have to deal with this shit again. When I leave Saturday my brahs with boot bags can go first and I'll do what they do

[AtomicSkier]

1 hour ago, indiggio said:

Here we go!
We ran into the same issue in Philly going out to Denver last week.
United baggage UI software royally sucks donkey dick!
There's no indication on the page that says you have to do anything special for ski and boot bags, so I just went on my merry way checking 1 bag, expecting it to ask me later whether they're skis/boot, but no.  It never asked and never printed out a second luggage ticket.   When I went to drop the bag off, they guy said there's an exception button at the bottom of the page.   Can you make it any LESS obvious?   He printed out a second bag ticket for boot bag.

On the way back we thought we had it figured out.   1 bag checked, pushed the exception button, no I don't want free check my carry on.  Kiosk starts flashing for attendant, probably for weight, as there's a scale right there).   Attendant comes over, scans badge, pushes some button and walks away.  One ticket gets printed!  WTF???  Fight through crowd to get attendant back to get second ticket printed.  How is this saving any time?  Absolutely stupid!

Get into Philly awaiting ski bag.   Carousel comes to stop, ask attendant, no more bags.   Slim & my ski bags nowhere to be found.  Get in line with like 20 others from flight who also didn't get their skis.   Go into office and attendant has a list of all our bags and checks off my name on the list, I see Slim's name there too.  WTF? 

Skis end up being delivered next day at 11pm.

Off to X to complain.  Got $40 luggage fee refunded.

Doesn't happen at the Premier counter 🤷‍♂️

[saltyant]

1 hour ago, AtomicSkier said:

Doesn't happen at the Premier counter 🤷‍♂️

Oooh Lo Que Dijo!!!

[GrilledSteezeSandwich]

13 minutes ago, saltyant said:

Oooh Lo Que Dijo!!!

Jajajaja…are you skiing at beaver creek?

[saltyant]

43 minutes ago, GrilledSteezeSandwich said:

Jajajaja…are you skiing at beaver creek?

I think Vail's big enough that I'm fine staying here. I don't feel like learning another mountain. The first day here was confusing as fudge trying to figure out where to go. Now I'm getting the feel for the layout 

[GrilledSteezeSandwich]

3 minutes ago, saltyant said:

I think Vail's big enough that I'm fine staying here. I don't feel like learning another mountain. The first day here was confusing as fudge trying to figure out where to go. Now I'm getting the feel for the layout 

Is it crowded?  

[saltyant]

13 minutes ago, GrilledSteezeSandwich said:

Is it crowded?  

Nah