Deer Valley officially kicked off its 2020-21 ski season Saturday.
Although Deer Valley opened to the general public on Saturday, the resort held a special season pass holder session Friday afternoon to give loyal guests a bonus day on the slopes and to get out any last-minute kinks in their new COVID-19 protocols.
Deer Valley’s health and safety protocols mirror those in place at neighboring Park City Mountain Resort, with masks mandatory and social distancing required in lift lines and on lifts themselves.
Deer Valley Marketing Director Coleen Reardon says despite the dry conditions in the days leading up to opening day, cold temperatures and an early base of snow allowed the resort to open 18 runs for the first day of the season.
“We had decent amounts of snowfall prior to this little spell here,” says Reardon. “It was decent, we had some good storms that laid down a significant amount of snow during those storms before it got kind of quiet and dry again. And then, fortunately, it’s been nice and cold so we’ve been able to really crank up the snow guns, which is why we’ll have 18 total runs open. We’re doing it in the Deer Valley fashion, we only open a run after it’s got a good 24 inches on it, whether that’s man-made, Mother Nature, or a combination thereof.”
Deer Valley used its summer operations as a dry run of sorts to test out best practices and fine tune before the first day of the winter season. Reardon says things went well over the summer and almost all of the summer changes carried over to winter, including reservations for on-mountain dining, which has been popular so far.
“You know, our plans are constantly evolving based on the conditions at hand and guidelines and best practices, so I think we haven’t changed much,” she explains. “We’ve had to go a little less on our indoor capacity so the restaurant indoor seating is fairly well booked for the Christmas holiday already, but still plenty of options at it relates to grab and go for our guests. So they can still eat, it’ll just be hard to get a restaurant, especially for the holidays right now.”
One change that was carried over from the summer is limiting on-mountain capacity. Although Deer Valley isn’t calling it a reservation system like PCMR is, the resort is restricting the amount of day tickets sold each day.
Day-of ticket sales are not happening this year and all tickets must be bought online beforehand. People who have a Deer Valley or Ikon pass can ski on any day they want.
“You have to have paid for a ticket to guarantee access to the mountain and we are limiting capacity, so we’re really encouraging our guests who aren’t pass holders to purchase in advance so that they guarantee that access so they’re not disappointed,” Reardon says. “What’s so interesting in all of this is we have been doing that for years, we’ve limited our capacity on the mountain since day one and so we have a lot of history on how to do it and how to do it successfully. The bottom line is we’ll take a hit on daily paid tickets to make sure that our season pass holders have access.”
As of this report, no days have sold out yet on the Deer Valley website, but several dates after December 20th look to be filling up fast.
Reardon says the number of people allowed on the mountain each day is a constantly changing number reflected by the current COVID-19 situation and the amount of terrain open to skiers, just like PCMR.
“It’s reflective of the COVID-19 situation and it’s also reflective of how much of the mountain we’ll have open,” she says. “Right now, we’ve got a good start, this is a good opening for Deer Valley and we’ve got our fingers crossed we’ll get into another really good weather pattern but we’ll still continue to make snow and provide a good holiday, but absolutely, like I said, it’s a moving target.”
For more information on Deer Valley’s winter operations or to buy a day ticket, click here.
