SKI TRIP

January 25-29, 2004

Budget

At this time, I would like to ask for your help. If you haven't yet heard, I just lost my job on January 2nd. I was contemplating not making this trip, which would stick all of you in a position to pay an extra $27 each. I really can't afford to go, but due to the generosity of Mike, Eric, and my parents, I'm going! If you would be willing to help them help me go by donating $20 (or more), please contact Mike.

Lodging

Lodging is a total of $600 for four nights, and with six of us going, that is $100 per person. Everyone has already paid, so nothing more will be due for lodging from anyone.

Lift Tickets

If you check the Copper Mountain Website, you will find ticket prices to be $64 per day for the days we will be skiing. My friends, you will not pay $64 or even $59, and not even $49 like some of you may be thinking. Not $39 and not even $29! No, I have arranged a deal for us to get $24 lift tickets, saving you $40 per day! Because of my early planning, I am saving the six of us a total of $720! How did I get this deal, you ask? I got us a couple of Copper Cards! Please scroll down to the "Capper Cards" section to read more about it. To sum it up, lift tickets will cost you a total of $72 for three days of skiing.

Ski Rentals

The above-mentioned Copper Card can also get us a 10% discount on ski rentals (excluding Sport Package) right at Copper Mountain. I recommend going this route, because if you happen to get a bad fit, you don't have to wait until the next day or make a special trip to get an exchange. Let me know what you think. Copper Mountain is also currently running a coupon special on their website where you can get 20% off their performance ski packages; just print the coupon and show them a Copper Card! Copper's regular-priced ski packages run $21.99 for the Sport Package, $28.99 for the Performace Package, and $34.99 for the Hi-Pro Package. With the discount: $23.19 for the Performance Package and $27.99 for the Hi-Pro Package. Package prices are per day, 4.5% surcharge to be added to all sales. These prices can change, so check out their website for yourself. Skis can be stored overnight at Copper for $4 per night. There are also several ski rental shops in Frisco. Most of them are local establishments, so they don't have a web page for information. We would need to call to find out how much we could save over Copper. If you take the initiative to make some calls, please let me know their prices so that I can post them here.

Food

This is one of my favorite things about the ski trip! This year, I am budgeting $5 per meal per person for the meals we prepare ourselves, and $8 per meal per person for the meals we eat out. If you review the Schedule, you'll see that we will be eating in ten meals and eating out four meals. Do the math; this boils down to a food bill of $82 per person; $50 of which will go towards the grocery bill ($300 total grocery budget). Please note that this figure is flexible, and the more extras (booze, pop, and snacks) we buy, the more the grocery bill will be. Because of our limited vehicle space, we are going to try and do our grocery shopping in Frisco. I have located a Safeway in Frisco, and they happen to post their weekly deals on the Internet. It might be a good idea to check this sight out just before we go on our trip and adjust our menu slightly to match their specials for that week. I reccomend getting the booze, pop, and snacks in Lincoln before we leave. Let me know what you think.

Transportation & Parking

We'll be taking Mike's awesome full-size van this year on the trip. It isn't the greatest on gas mileage, but it is quite comfortable. I don't know how gas prices are in Nebraska and Colorado, but they are currently around $1.60 per gallon here. The trip is 560 miles one way. We'll also eat up about $5 worth of gas per day just running around, and close-in parking at Copper is $15 per day. Add it all up and it is a total of $210 for transportation and parking, making it around $35 per person. Usually, we just take turns filling up the van and paying for parking. However, with six of us going, I'm not sure if Mike's van will require six fill-ups. If you have a good idea on how to keep track of all of this, please let me know.

The Bottom Line

Lodging:	$100.00
Lift Tickets:	$72.00
Ski Rentals:	$72.69
Food:	$82.00
Transportation:	$35.00
Total:	$361.69

Above figures are per person. Please deduct $100 from lodging for your balance.

Copper Cards

My wife has an uncle in Lakewood, Colorado, and I got him to purchased us two Copper Cards to use while we are skiing. The cards only cost $10 each, but I struck a deal with my wife's uncle where he'd split the cost with me if I let him use the cards the rest of the season. What a deal! $10 saves us $720+! Copper Cards are intended for the locals, and they are only available through October, so it is a good thing I started planning early this year. As you can see from the above figures, they will allow us to get extreme discounts on lift tickets and equipment rentals. They will also allow us to get discounts on dining and discounts at some of the shops at Copper. Each card only gets us four discounted lift tickets per day, but I just knew that there would be more than four of us going, so I ordered two cards! Other than for lift tickets, any one of us can use the cards as often as we like. Visit 2mountaincard.com (Username: redling, Password: aaron1) to find out about some of the other special deals we can get. (Please do not change any of the information in the profile.)

(Updated 1/10/2003)