Like last year, we stayed at the Grand Lodge.  This place had everything we needed: large rooms with plenty of storage, friendly staff, on-site restaurant, hot tub and pool, and most importantly, very close proximity to the lift lines.  We kept our skis in our car, and each morning just walked to the car, grabbed our gear, and walked to the lift.  No rush, no lines, no worries.

The snow conditions were not very good this year (last year CB had epic snow totals, so we were totally spoiled).  However, the snow was good enough to have a great time, and the complete and utter lack of crowds made the ski experience amazing.  We did enjoy a couple of lunches on the mountain, one at Paradise Warming Hut, and one quick lunch sitting outside on lounge chairs at the top of Painter Boy lift.

Our dinners in Crested Butte were quite good.  We had one quick and easy dinner on our night of arrival at the Grand Lodge.  It was OK resort food.  On Saturday night, we had amazing pizza and great beer at Brick Oven Pizza, definitely a local favorite.  And, on Sunday night we visited the ever-popular The Last Steep and wondered why we had never eaten here - we loved it! 

Attention all coffee lovers.  Camp 4 is still the BEST coffee in Crested Butte, and it may be the best coffee in Colorado.  We visited the Camp 4 in Mount Crested Butte (they have 3 locations), since it was across from the Grand Lodge.  Expect long lines (due to its popularity), but enjoy the ambiance and savor the expectations.  Amazing coffee without the pomp and snotty attitudes of a trendy coffee shop.  Camp 4 is just great coffee - and still very reasonably priced.

My favorite part of visiting Crested Butte?  The atmosphere.  This is a true mountain town.  It is all local, no chain restaurants, no chain hotels, no buildings in town over 2 stories high, nothing too fancy, and everything laid back.  The speed limit in town is 15mph - and no one drives that fast.  There are a couple of 4-way stops at intersections, and it is an exercise in politeness, to see who can let others go before them.  The town has loads of bicycles, even in the dead of winter with icy, snow packed roads.  Of all the bikes we saw in town, not one was locked.  Locals greet each other with hugs, and seem to put up quite nicely with the out-of-state tourists who flock here.  Sure, we are from Colorado, but we actually felt in the minority as most of the tourists we bumped into were from out of state.  

One of my goals is to eventually move to a small island in the South Pacific, where the locals are friendly and the pace is slow and casual.  Crested Butte is my favorite ski mountain town because it is as close to 'South Pacific Island' as I can get in Colorado.