There's more than meets the eye at Beaver Creek

All photography courtesy of Beaver Creek Resort

Beaver Creek Resort is synonymous with luxury experiences and good skiing. Whether it’s the freshly baked cookies being served to you after your last run of the day or the quaint base area village with its ice rink centerpiece, the Beav offers amenities that make its guests—including celebrities and former Presidents— swoon with happiness. But skiers, especially the FREESKIER audience, seeking thigh-burning, high-velocity skiing, often overlook this Rocky Mountain gem for its bougie exterior. We’re here to dispel the rumors and give you the inside scoop on why Beaver Creek should be next on your list of resorts to ski.

For starters, the advanced and expert terrain available is just that. Most of the skiers at Beaver Creek stick to the rolling groomers and other less challenging runs, leaving the the more demanding, technical terrain wide open for your skiing pleasure. Take our word for it: On a powder day, you’ll be pillaging fresh snow with your crew from early morning until late afternoon without the need to rush from stash to stash. Expert terrain like the Stone Creek Chutes, Royal Elk Glade on Grouse Mountain and the trees in Thresher Glade are sure to keep you grinning.

When it fills in, the Stone Creek Chutes offer technical skiing and a handful of rowdy cliff drops.

Beaver Creek is also a true skier’s mountain: one that offers long mogul runs, tight, gladed terrain and steep, groomed runs. Here, you can work on your fundamentals, carving deep trenches down runs like Sheephorn and Centennial, before heading over to Larkspur and Rose Bowl to play around in more wide-open terrain. And if you’re looking to bump-hump like the hot doggers of late, you won’t need to search very far. Nearly every run at Beaver Creek has an ungroomed portion, where advanced skiers can hug the treeline and play around on the berms and moguls that form over the course of the season. Skiers pursuing a true mogul-oriented experience, make your way to Peregrine or Goshawk for top-to-bottom bumpage.

For those who don’t want to make the drive past Vail on a snow day, or for Front Range skiers who think Beaver Creek is “out of their league,” think again. The Beav offers a surplus of advanced terrain, given the number of expert skier’s who seek it out, and provides an on-hill and village experience that even the most money-conscious two-plankers can enjoy. We recommend you pack a lunch and eat it on the sun deck at Red Tail Lodge where you’ll be able to look up at the infamous Birds of Prey downhill course, then spend the afternoon exploring Grouse Mountain before heading over to the Blue Moose Pizzeria for some après bevies and freshly prepared ‘za.

In all, Beaver Creek’s luxurious amenities, charming village with top-tier restaurants and plentiful terrain—nearly 2,000 acres of it—are what brings in most of its clientele, but just beneath its fancy exterior is a ski resort that offers something for every budget and every kind of skier. If you’re looking for a new place to ski in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains, take this as the inspiration you need to book that next trip. Or, if you’re like us at FREESKIER and just want to have the mountain to yourself on a powder day, this is your cue to explore Beaver Creek to its fullest extent. You’ll quickly find there’s more than meets the eye at this iconic Colorado ski resort.