Keystone

Terrain:

Keystone has one of the best terrain parks in Colorado. Their famous Area 51 terrain park is one of my favorite parks to hit. If I want to do a strictly park day with my buddies, this is one of the resorts I go to. I first started getting into park riding here in fact. There are a variety of parks Keystone has that give way to a great progression of park riding. There is a beginner park with small features which is perfect to learn in. It has boxes close to the ground and mini jumps. This beginner terrain park is called Easy street. This area is great for getting used to jumps and sliding on boxes. Then there is a I-70 terrain Park with medium features for those who are more comfortable in the park. This area is where I started to learn how to ride rails. This park is probably my favorite of the terrain parks. It has great M sizes jumps and easier rails to hit for those just starting to hit rails.

The other two L parks are great for experienced park riders. The Alley and Park Lane are filled with a wide variety of different L rails. Keystone usually has some of the coolest challenging rail hits. Then there is a L jump line in the Main Street park. These L featured parks are fun to watch advanced park skiers hit tricks on all day. A huge thing that I love about Keystones parks are that they are all in one area on the mountain; Area 51. This enables the rider to stay in one area when wanting to do a park day. It also keeps all the park rats in one area so others can enjoy the rest of the mountain without them. Most resorts you have to go to different areas to get to certain parks, it is much nicer to have all the parks easily accessed from one lift.

Other than the great parks, Keystone also has an abundant amount of bowls to explore. There are five bowls that one can only access via cat or by hiking. Some of the bowls can only be skied with a guided cat tour. Others are more easily accessible by hiking. These hikes are quite long especially when you are boot packing (hiking in your boots). If I want to do bowl skiing, Keystone would not be the place I’d choose because none of the bowls are lift accessed. This may appeal to some, because this means there is less traffic and more availability for fresh tracks.

Keystone also has some great steep mogul and blue runs. If you are wanting to break you or your friends speed record, Keystone is the place to do it. But be careful, they take their slow skiing areas very seriously. You will get your pass pulled if you’re being reckless. A lot of these steep blues can be icy on most days, so be cautious as always. The mogul runs are also steep long mogul runs, which may not sound fun to most.  Because they are so long, you really feel like you’re getting a work out in and doing some good skiing or boarding, especially since the lifts are quite fast as well. This means more time skiing and less time sitting on the lift.

If you need a break from these long runs, head over to the front side of the mountain. There is a great area that has all the beginner terrain. Again this area has very long runs, but there are plenty of spots to rest. This area also has some fun kid areas. This includes little cabins to ski through, bank slaloms in the woods. No matter how old I am, I will always enjoy going through these kid parks. These kid parks are great at getting kids more interested in skiing and boarding. Ripperoo’s Forest is my favorite of the kid parks and when given the opportunity I will always go through the kid parks because they put a smile on my face and I can feel like a kid again.

Base Elevation – 9,280 ft

Peak Elevation – 12,408 ft

Number of Lifts – 21

Number of Trails – 129

Total Terrain – 3,149 acres

Easiest Terrain (Greens) – 12%

More Difficult Terrain (Blues) – 39%

Most Difficult/Expert Terrain (Blacks/Double Blacks)  – 49%

Resort Hours – 8:30am-4pm Daily

Atmosphere and Locals:

Keystone is one of the smaller Vail owned resorts in Colorado. You get less of a family presence and more of a local college student and younger groups of skiers. This is mainly because of the awesome terrain park, Area 51, Keystone has. This brings in a huge park rat crowd, which depending on your riding preferences could be the vibe you are looking for. Keystone also brings in the younger crowd from the local mountain areas, mainly Summit County.

Out of the Vail resorts in Colorado, Keystone is the closest to Denver and makes for a good quick day trip destination. Before the Ikon pass came to fruition, the epic pass was very popular in Colorado, especially among the younger skiing and boarding populations. Now that the Ikon has spread out people’s choices of resorts, there has been a bit of a decrease in Epic pass holders. Although it is hard to pull those away from Keystone. You can still find those who love to strictly ski at Keystone, who have been doing so for years. I know plenty of people who live in Summit County, grew up skiing there and it is still one of their favorite resorts to go to. Those with the Epic pass will choose Keystone to go to as a place to ski and board with their friends in their free time.

Accessibility and Parking:

There is a small free parking lot near the base, that will fill up quickly on the weekends. Thus there are two other overflow lots that have a shuttle that will take you to the mountain. The other base parking lots are all pay to park. There is not much space when it comes to parking at Keystone, but I have never heard of Keystone turning people away because the lots were full. This could be due to the fact that Keystone is surrounded by plenty of other resorts.

There is not an easy way to get to Keystone. You have to go out of the way most of the time to get there. You can either take I-70 to Dillion or HWY 6. HWY 6 will take you by Arapahoe Basin and if I-70 is very crowded can be a short cut. Although, due to weather HWY 6 often closes. Then, going through I-70 there is almost always traffic. Keystone is only an hour and a half away from Denver, which makes the I-70 drive less daunting than other resorts.

Pricing: $$

Lift Tickets – 

Currently Unavailable due to COVID-19.

Associated Season Pass – Epic Pass

Lessons – 

Currently Unavailable due to COVID-19.

Rentals – 

Demo Skis: $85

Performance Skis: $75

Sport Skis: $65

Junior Skis: $45

Demo Board: $85

Performance Board: $65

Junior Board: $45

For more information visit https://www.keystoneresort.com/