Shoot From the Lifts Promotion Gets Mixed Reviews

Special to the Horseshoe from Tips Up Magazine – October 21, 2015

(Crested Butte) In an attempt to lure rifle hunters to town, Crested Butte Mountain Resort is offering hunter packages which include access to all lifts for the purpose of filling deer and elk tags for 2015.

This is how it works: A hunter stays at one of the approved CBMR hotels at the off-season rate and, in addition to heavenly views, cable TV and room service, he is allowed to ride the lifts in search of his prey.

Already about a dozen bow hunters found success riding the lifts. East River and Teocali were the most productive with one black powder marksman from Colona nailing a bull elk at the top of Paradise.

The program seems headed for success since their is exists no governing body that can legally restrict the action.

“With all the meddlesome agencies out there we felt for sure that this controversial sporting event would fall under some jurisdiction or the other,” said Melvin Toole illegitimate brainchild of CBMR. “OSHA was our biggest problem initially but that body dropped out when it became apparent that nobody was really on-the-job. Then it was the treasury people who backed off after we proved that no money was actually changing hands. Finally the local authorities got into the act, but we showed that there was no discharging of firearms within anyone’s city limits.”

Sources at the ski area expect more than 2000 hunters to take advantage of the offer. Target groups from Oklahoma, Texas and Kansas will make up the meat of the participants while contingents of urban hunters and the handicapped should round out the group.

“Imagine full lifts running 12 hours per day packed with men in orange,” said Toole. “It’s the perfect answer to the downtime between mushroom hunting and the free ski promotion. Who knows, we might even sell a little real estate out of our back pockets.”

Critics of the plan say they plan to file a plethora of lawsuits adding that “some of them folks over at CBMR have been smoking too much snodgrass.”

Over in Telluride the town gondola will remain out-of-service until Thanksgiving due to clown council concerns that a stray bullet may accidentally hit a celebrity, which would include a conservative 90% of the people walking around. Hunters with Telluride Cards will, of corpse, have access to the upper lifts, depending on political persuasion.

“We don’t have time for much of this silliness,” said a spokesman for the marketing department at Telluride Ski and Golf Then Ski Again. “We are far too busy attempting to manipulate sunrise and sunset so as to increase skier days this year. Imagine cruising the Stairs or Can’t Make ‘Em with the sun on your back all afternoon. Let them promise that at Aspen or Vail.” – Uncle Pahgre