A-Basin via ferrata

I know some people will shit on this, but it's interesting to see these popping up.

The Know Outdoors article

Bullet points:

• Highest in N America
• 800 or 1500' long, depending on which paragraph you believe; tops out at 13k
• Half or full-day excursions; guided only of course
• $425-575 for first two people; $125 for each additional person (!!!)
• But you get a box lunch!

From A-Basin's webpage: ...."this is a climbing experience at a very high elevation (beginning around 12,000 feet) and there is a half-mile hike required before and after the climb. This is not something you want to do the day after you get off the plane from a sea-level location."

Texans, you have been warned!

Dara wrote:

Texans, you have been warned!

they're still gonna do it in jeans....

damn these are getting expensive 

agreed. and I'm a little annoyed by the fact that you cannot do it un-guided like the one in telluride. i get that a-basin is trying to make back the $$ it took to build it, but that is expensive...

Holy smokes that is not cheap. I guess if that's a thing you wanna do cool - the families who come to ski for a day or two will certainly not flinch at this price. Something tells me this isn't going to be open in June, unless the snow melts a lot quicker than it is. A Basin can ski into July if they wanted to. So, is there a lift to take before that half mile hike, too?

From the photos, the terrain looks very tame - like < Class 3 you'd have a hard time falling off of if you tried. Anything steeper is super contrived. If it goes to an old mine shaft... well what did the miners use.

Well that's capitalism for ya. 

The North American model of guided only VFs is super lame.  It's exactly how NOT to run them.  Look at Europe.  All the $ is made by getting people to VISIT the VF and then have great food and drink nearby at the HUT etc.  You could still charge guiding fees and then a day pass for self guided.  My group of 6 is SPECIFICALLY visiting Telluride and Ouray to get on theirs.  I refuse to pay a guide with the amount of experience climbing and VF I have.  These resorts need to figure out a better model to get more visits on these wires.   

Bill Schick wrote:

This is on FS land, no?  Most of A-Basin is.  Kind of weird they would be able to block other users for a commercial operation.  It's one thing to operate a lift, but blocking access to a public trail or a piece of rock so they can make more money seems ultimately unenforceable.

It depends on their contract with the forest service, but for the most part ski areas have full control over their leased land in terms of access.