Sking out West. Ship equipment or rent?

[WeFourSki]

Planning our first family trip to Park City in February. Wondering about shipping our equip, taking it as additional luggage on the flight or renting when we get there?

We are all avid, experienced skiers, and own very good equipment. So, to use it would be our preference. Either way, there's no easy answer I can think of:
We prefer to bring our own gear, but could cost $200 each (r/t) for extra baggage on the flights
If we ship to the hotel ahead of time (FedEx), we risk loosing or having them stolen - and it's also costly.
Renting at Park City is $40+ p/day for each of the 4 of us. That adds up!

Are there options I'm not considering? What do you do?

Thanks!

 

[WeFourSki]

Question answered!

Just found out, we are flying Southwest and you can check skis at no addl cost. Thank goodness.

 

[ctenidae]

You should totally bring your stuff. Southwest will let you check skis.

wait...what?

 

[soposkier]

southwest you get two free checked bags (skis and boots count as one together)

 

[wa-loaf]

Just found out, we are flying Southwest and you can check skis at no addl cost. Thank goodness.

I always take Southwest to ski country. Never had a hitch with my ski bags.

 

[C-Rex]

Southwest rules. I just booked nonstop roundtrip flights Denver to Bradley and back for $289. And no baggage fees for my boards. Can't beat that!

 

[hammer]

What kind of car are you renting? Have to get the skis from the airport...

Looking back, I'd say that unless you want to get demo skis (and know what kind of demos you would like to try out), bring your own would be the way to go. It is a PITA hauling more gear around but rentals are pricey.

 

[gladerider]

..... but rentals are pricey.

especially if you know your equipments and are a picky one

 

[ctenidae]

What kind of car are you renting? Have to get the skis from the airport...

Looking back, I'd say that unless you want to get demo skis (and know what kind of demos you would like to try out), bring your own would be the way to go. It is a PITA hauling more gear around but rentals are pricey.

A Smart 4-4 is a bad choice for this. I speak from experience.

 

[hammer]

A Smart 4-4 is a bad choice for this. I speak from experience.

With a family of 4 including ski boot bags (no skis) even a Jeep Grand Cherokee was tight...

 

[mlctvt]

We're going to Park City too,also our first time out west, but we're going to rent Demos.

Anyone have a recommendation for Park City ski rentals? Aloha looks good since they have four locations and you can rent from one and drop off at another, or switch them for other models, throughout the week.
If you rented skis in Park City, I'd like to hear about how it went.

 

[hammer]

We're going to Park City too,also our first time out west, but we're going to rent Demos.

Anyone have a recommendation for Park City ski rentals? Aloha looks good since they have four locations and you can rent from one and drop off at another, or switch them for other models, throughout the week.
If you rented skis in Park City, I'd like to hear about how it went.

There are a number of rental outfits in Park City and my one experience wasn't that great...renting demos is tough when you are not sure what you want to try out. If you know what you want to try out you may be able to talk with the Park City shop ahead of time to see if they will have it.

One word of advice is to always lock or check your equipment. Had my demo skis stolen first day at PCMR which made for a rough day and a big expense at the end of the week (no insurance for loss and the rental outfit charged me the going retail price).

 

[LonghornSkier]

Despite all the love for Southwest, there is one glaring disadvantage you have if you fly them. If something goes awry in your travels, Southwest will not re-book you on another airline.

 

[SKIQUATTRO]

you dont really need to rent a car, they have great shuttle service from airport to PC and the PC transportation system is fantastic.

 

[drjeff]

My 2 cents here, as a family traveling with YOUNGER kids multiple times to Park City and flying Southwest.

We ship our skis, and a couple of big gear bags. If you can get the packed bags to Fedex Ground on Monday, they're waiting at your hotel for you on Saturday. It generally runs between $50-$75 per bag shipped depending on the dimensions and how much the bag weighs. You have a tracking number, so you're not worried about loosing your gear. And then you can often get a smaller car, if you're going to rent one, since you don't have to factor in getting all your ski gear and clothes and people in your party too/from the airport. When we go out the end of February this year, we'll have on the plane just a couple of big suitcases for all of our clothes and then our carry-ons. This also makes life much easier when traveling with a 6 and 8 year old to NOT have a few hundred extra pounds of gear to lug around IMHO.

On the way home, you can either ship your gear right from most hotels, or with our skis, we usually plan on skiing at Deer Valley on our last day, and they'll ship your skis via Fed Ex directly from their ski check locations at their Snow Park and Silver Lake Base Lodges.

As my kids get older and are much more able to be helpful in lugging big gear bags around the airport, I'll probably start flying with some of our gear. But in general, I do find it much more mentally comfortable, especially on the way out there, knowing via a Fed Ex tracking number where my gear is.

As for ski rentals out there. Aloha is good. Jans is good too

 

[Nick]

Southwest rules. I just booked nonstop roundtrip flights Denver to Bradley and back for $289. And no baggage fees for my boards. Can't beat that!

That's a great price..... !

 

[dartmouth01]

+1 for Southwest. My random tip is to get the Southwest Visa card and earn points that way too. Its one of the better cards out there points per dollar, as long as you are ok with using your points towards Southwest. Since my gf and I fly Southwest a few times a year, it works out to our favor better than a 1% cashback card (tho we will use our other cards, like Discover, when the deal is better than 1%.) Southwest works out to basically $1 on Southwest for every $60 you spend. 1% cashback is of course $1 back for every $100 you spend. However, if you catch the special 5% cashback offers on any card, you basically get back $1 for every $20 you spend, which of course is even better than southwest. If you have a discover card, you can also get cashback on purchases from retailers if you link thru their website. I'll get 15% back on groupon purchases just by linking from Discover to Groupon! But I digress.

To get back to topic tho, get ski bags big enough to hold multiple skis when flying any airline, including Southwest. This allows you more checked bags. As long as the weight is under 50 lb/bag, it doesnt matter. My gf and I will bring our boards+skis out with us if we go on a longer trip out west. Between the two of us we get 4 bags total. One bag contains two pairs of skis/poles, another contains two boards. Then we fill a suitcase with boots/clothes, and the final check bag will also be more gear, if we need it. One time I even brought my skis AND my golf clubs out west, in the same bag. i <3 Southwest!

 

[Nick]

+1 for Southwest. My random tip is to get the Southwest Visa card and earn points that way too. Its one of the better cards out there points per dollar, as long as you are ok with using your points towards Southwest. Since my gf and I fly Southwest a few times a year, it works out to our favor better than a 1% cashback card (tho we will use our other cards, like Discover, when the deal is better than 1%.) Southwest works out to basically $1 on Southwest for every $60 you spend. 1% cashback is of course $1 back for every $100 you spend. However, if you catch the special 5% cashback offers on any card, you basically get back $1 for every $20 you spend, which of course is even better than southwest. If you have a discover card, you can also get cashback on purchases from retailers if you link thru their website. I'll get 15% back on groupon purchases just by linking from Discover to Groupon! But I digress.

To get back to topic tho, get ski bags big enough to hold multiple skis when flying any airline, including Southwest. This allows you more checked bags. As long as the weight is under 50 lb/bag, it doesnt matter. My gf and I will bring our boards+skis out with us if we go on a longer trip out west. Between the two of us we get 4 bags total. One bag contains two pairs of skis/poles, another contains two boards. Then we fill a suitcase with boots/clothes, and the final check bag will also be more gear, if we need it. One time I even brought my skis AND my golf clubs out west, in the same bag. i <3 Southwest!

I actually just got a deal where you get a southwest credit card, and use once, get 50k points on the card (enough for 2 RT tickets). my wife and I each signed up and we had 100,000 points. Instead of airfare though I redeemed it for $1200 in Amazon gift cards.