So, you’ve heard of Furry Ski Weekend and want to attend? This guide will help you, from someone who just attended their first Furry Ski Weekend.
What is Furry Ski Weekend?
Furry Ski Weekend is a 3-day event that takes place each year at Copper Mountain, an incredible ski resort located in the mountains of Colorado, about two hours west of Denver. Attendees hang out, enjoy the hot tub, ski, snowboard, and most important of all: ski or snowboard while fursuiting!
Registration
Furry Ski Weekend is a private event, with attendance limited to approved guests. In order to attend, you must first register. Registration includes providing information about yourself, your skiing/snowboarding experience, and the people you know. The FSW administration will go through each application and decide if you will be invited to attend FSW.
Some factors used when reading your application include:
- Your skiing/snowboarding ability
- Your relationship with FSW staffers
- Existing connections with attendees of previous FSW events
- Your personality and how well you will fit in with existing FSW guests
To register, keep an eye on furryskiweekend.com and the @furryskiweekend twitter page. Registration opens in the fall of each year. When open, create an account on the furryskiweekend.com site and fill out the registration form. Provide as much information as possible, and if you know people who have attended FSW in previous years, make sure to list them. They will be contacted to verify that they know you, so don’t make stuff up!
Approval
Once you are approved to attend Furry Ski Weekend, you will receive an email with a payment link. Pay for the event promptly — your reservation is not confirmed until you do. The payment includes lodging for 3 nights, meals, drinks, and lift tickets for 2 days. It’s a pretty good deal!
When payment is received, you will be invited into a private Telegram channel where you can discuss any questions with other attendees. The event is limited to around 72 attendees, so you can pretty quickly get to know everyone.
Now is a good time to log back in to the furryskiweekend.com website and fill out your profile. Put in a profile picture, specify your dietary restrictions, and specify your preferred roommates. Housing can be a bit confusing at FSW.
Housing
The FSW administration rents as many as eight houses each year. The houses range from the largest one (“Masters 36”) to smaller ones scattered nearby. All of the houses are within walking distance of the ski slopes, and the main house. They are referred to by their street address within the housing complex at Copper Mountain.
The main house, known as Masters 36, is the largest and is also where all the meals are served and where most hanging out happens. There is a hot tub, a place to change in and out of fursuits, and a giant living room and patio. The main house also has several bedrooms.
The other houses are a short walk from the main house, and are smaller, but still very nice. Each house is equipped with several bedrooms, a kitchen, a living room, a dining area, and several bathrooms with showers.
You have several choices for determining your housing location.
- Specify your roommates: Using the Profile section of the website, specify the people you’d like to room with. Make sure they do the same for you! When housing is assigned, FSW staff will try to put all people that want to room together into the same house.
- Build your own house: If you have 8 people (depending on house capacity) you’d like to be together with, you can inform FSW staff that you all want to be in the same house and make their lives a lot easier! They’ll probably even let you pick which house you want.
- Stay in the main house: The main house has lots of bedrooms and lots of space, and is close to the action. However, it is also the noisiest house. It will be difficult to get peace & quiet at the main house.
Getting There
FSW is located just west of Denver, so you’ll probably be flying into Denver Internation Airport (DEN). If you live near sea level as most of us do, be aware that Denver is at 5,400 ft altitude, the FSW base camp is at 9,000 ft, and the top of the mountain where the ski lifts take you is 12,000 ft. You will experience lightheadedness and shortness of breath. Alcohol will affect you more readily. If you can, try to arrive in Denver a few days before the event to give your body time to acclimatize.
You’ll either need to rent a car at DEN for the approx. 2-hour drive to FSW, or carpool with someone else. Make sure your car has snow tires, because snowfall can happen suddenly and unexpectedly. On our day leaving, 8 inches was dumped overnight!
At the Event
During Furry Ski Weekend, you’re pretty much left to your own devices on what you want to do. Obviously, skiing and snowboarding are the main activities. Most people get up around 7 AM to have breakfast, so they can hit the slopes by 8:30 or 9 AM.
The Furry Ski Weekend staff will designate a day and time for the official Fursuit Skiing/Snowboarding, so keep an eye on the telegram channel. But you can also do this at any time, although it is recommended to not go alone. A document will be posted to help you find other skiers of your skill level and interest.
Usually on the 2nd day after skiing finishes, the group snow tubing will begin. This costs a few dollars extra but is well worth it, as Copper’s snow tube hill is quite good.
Meals
Each house is stocked with breakfast supplies: Eggs, bacon, english muffins, etc. You will be responsible for making your own breakfast. Perhaps you can work with your roommates to decide on a breakfast schedule.
Lunch is left up to you. There are dozens of restaurants in the village at Copper, as well as restaurants located at the chalets at mid-mountain. The main house also has a full supply of snacks, energy bars, and beverages.
Dinner is served around 6:30pm in the main house, and is prepared by volunteers. All of the food is incredible and the chefs that volunteer their time are very skilled. Nobody goes hungry!
Apres-Ski
After skiing finishes at 4pm, most people either chill in their house or come to the main house for food, drinks, and fursuiting. The vibe is very chill as pretty much everyone is exhausted from skiing. Spend some time in the hot tub to relieve your aches.
Goodbye, FSW
Checkout on Sunday morning is at 10am. Hopefully you didn’t stay up too late the night before! Get your stuff out by 10 am to avoid irritating the FSW staff, say your goodbyes, and enjoy the views of the mountains on the drive back to Denver!
