Berthoud Pass Ski Area

Berthoud Pass Ski Area near Winter Park, Colorado, sat at the summit of U.S. 40 on the Continental Divide, with a base around 11,300 feet. Skiers had been coming to the pass since the early 1930s, when the Colorado Mountain Club ran Sunday trips, a Civilian Conservation Corps ski hut went up a few miles from the top, and the Forest Service and the club cut ski trails. A rope tow opened in February 1937, and Denver buses brought weekend skiers over the road.

In 1947 a double chairlift opened on the west side, built with ideas from Sam Huntington, a part owner and manager. It carried about 400 skiers an hour and was sold as the first double chair in Colorado. A summit lodge followed in 1949 and held its grand opening in January 1950. Berthoud Pass Lodge, Inc., held by a few Colorado families, ran the area into the early 1970s, and Irma Hill took it over in 1972. Ike and Lucy Garst bought it in 1977, and skiing reopened that November.

The 1980s brought a lift accident, a sale, a short stretch under another name and a bankruptcy. Gary Schulz bought the area in 1989 and installed new lifts, a triple and a quad, and a 1989 trail guide advertised more than 1,000 vertical feet and 1,280 acres. The area went through liquidation in the early 1990s, then changed hands again in 1993 and 1999. Its chairlifts closed after the 2000-01 season, and a snowcat operation took over for two seasons.

In March 2003 the owners announced the end of the cat skiing and the removal of the lifts. The Forest Service tore down the old lodge in 2005. Today the pass has a rest area and warming hut at the summit, and the old runs are a busy backcountry ski zone reached from the highway.