Since the time of Moses, perplexed people have scaled mountains seeking answers. So it was that Vail Associates, troubled by guest surveys indicating too few evening activities, particularly for families, went to the top of its new EagleBahn gondola to create Adventure Ridge—a four-acre complex at the 10,350-foot level of Vail Mountain, alive with music, and featuring a wide choice of restaurants and a dizzying range of activities.
There is nothing inherently new with a ski area offering ice skating, snowtubing, night skiing and snowboarding as well as restaurants. What is new, at least in the context of the Rocky Mountains, is the totality of activities atop a mountain, all reachable via a free (after 4 p.m.) 8-minute ride in a heated 12-passenger gondola. If, as some say, the corporate strategy of Vail Resorts is to diversify, Adventure Ridge is the amplified implementation of that strategy in microcosm. And it has succeeded beyond expectations, with March crowds exceeding 2,000 per night, capped by a record 3,000 visitors during the week before Easter.
According to Chris Ryman, Vail Associates senior vice president and chief operating officer, if the resort management had expected that kind of success for Adventure Ridge, they would have been more aggressive in the scope and size of the project. But Adventure Ridge was created without a great deal of planning, and really was the result of Ryman having posed a rhetorical question to his staff: “What activities could be offered if we kept the gondola running at night?”
Last winter, while visiting resorts in the Alps, Ryman and other Vail executives had noted that the Swiss, Austrians and French manage their mountain resorts much more intensively than do their American counterparts and they wondered what they might do along these lines at Vail. Returning home with plans for a new $14 million gondola as well as a remodeling of the aging Eagle’s Nest gondola terminal, Ryman wanted answers to that question, and got them quickly. And the execution was just as quick: “An 18-month operation that was completed in eight months,” said one VA employee who was involved with the project.
The outdoor activities at Adventure Ridge range from the high-energy, like snowboarding and ice-skating, to the more passive, like a moonlight snowmobile ride.
For snowboarders under the lights, Adventure Park is the real thing: two 400-foot-long halfpipes and a terrain park with rails, jumps and slides. Nearby is an area for beginner ski and snowboard lessons, which cost $35 for an hour-and-a-half beginning at 5 p.m. This area is served by a free chairlift on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday evenings until 7:30 p.m. and a Poma surface lift that operates nightly until 10 p.m.
One new activity at Vail that was immediately successful is snowtubing. It was so popular that, from the first day of operation, people lined up 150 deep waiting to ride down the 100-yard-long chutes. In December, a second lift was added to reduce the people jam. Also in operation during the day, snowtubing is restricted to people who are at least 36 inches tall. For shorter types, there is sledding and saucer riding on tamer slopes. A one-hour snowtubing pass is $12 for adults, $8 for children; all children can sled or ride saucers for one hour at $4.
An 8,000-square-foot ice-skating rink occupies a center spot at Adventure Ridge and has attracted enough evening business to make an enlargement a possibility for next winter. Cost is $4 for skating alone or $8 with rental skates, but the warming fire pit is free.
Snowshoes can be rented for organized tours at 5 and 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday and Thursday evenings for $20, but a few people (mostly locals) have managed to sneak away for a nighttime snowshoe trip down the mountain. Sled Dog boots also can be rented.
In recent years, Vail offered backcountry snowmobiling, but this activity was shelved in favor of evening mountain-top snowmobile tours at Adventure Ridge. The backcountry operation had followed a road for 12 miles to the edge of the Eagle’s Nest Wilderness Area, but being 12 miles from pavement scared many visitors even when the snowmobiles were bumper to bumper, according to Ken Willis who directed the snowmobile tours for VA.
The new snowmobile tours at Adventure Ridge offer a lighter time commitment for guests lasting one hour and, except during storms, participants can be thrilled by moonlight views of surrounding mountains. The guided tours cost $40 for a single rider, $55 for two or $50 for an adult with a child or $52, $79 and $70 when they included dinner.
Music is ubiquitous at Adventure Ridge. Snowboarders hear rap chants near the halfpipes, Baby Boom moms and dads hear Eric Clapton while waiting for their kids at the base of the tubing hills. There is live music in the après-ski bar and a disk jockey serves sound in the pizzeria.
Not all the action at Adventure Ridge is outside, and immediately off the gondola are activities that can be enjoyed on even the coldest and windiest evenings. Inside Eagle’s Nest—the gondola terminal that was doubled in size and retrofitted with an alpine decor—there is a retail shop and no less than five restaurants that span a broad range of tastes and pocketbooks and stay open until 9:30 p.m.
Après-ski with spectacular views and sunsets can begin at the Blue Moon Bar, a 220-seat indoor lounge where drinks and light snacks are served, and also at Talons Deck, a 150-seat outdoor sundeck that serves rotisserie and barbecue-style food. At the higher end of the price scale, reached via a sleigh ride from the gondola terminal, is the Game Creek Club, located on a private parcel of land nearby and offering one of the Vail area’s most exclusive and elegant dining experiences. Also part of the mix at Eagle’s Nest is the Wine Stube, a fine-dining restaurant with entrees starting at $13 and The Market Place, which offers an all-you-can-eat buffet at $12 for adults and $8 for kids.
More unusual is the 130-seat Terminal Pizza with a decor and atmosphere that appeals to teenagers. Located in the terminus of the previous gondola, which is inside the new gondola building, the inte- [The rest of this article continues on a page not included in the source PDF.]
