Once we thought we understood San Juan County’s main concern regarding the dangers around winter access, we decided to start the actual approval process. We were confident that somehow, someway we could get an approval because there were already lots of backcountry lodges in operation. One in particular, called the Opus Hut, requires that guests cross a bunch of super steep avalanche paths to get to, so if they were approved, why not us?

In the application we put an avalanche danger mitigation strategy saying that we weren’t going to let guests access the lodge if the avalanche danger in our area got to a certain threshold on the official Colorado avalanche danger website. If we cancelled because of avalanche danger, then we would refund all of their money. With the confidence of out of towners, we submitted our application and went to the first of 4 meetings to get approval with the county planning commission. They approved us building a lodge on our land, but weren’t sure about the vacation rental thing, so they punted that to the County Commissioners.

In the County Commissioners meeting, we got torn up. These guys hated a bunch of out of towners telling them about how we were going to keep guests safe from avalanches. After that preliminary meeting, we made some tweaks to our plan, went back to the planning commission, got through, only to get back to the County Commissioners Final Approval meeting and get denied, I think it was 2 commissioners against, and 1 for.

After that rejection, I was so pissed off. We had tried so hard and spent so much time and money to jump through all their hoops. We had come up with a safety plan and then changed it to make them happy, and they had denied us. The really ridiculous part of all of this is, that any idiot that doesn’t know what they’re doing can rent a snowmobile and rip up past our property and go anywhere they want in the backcountry, in any avalanche conditions, at any time. There are no restrictions to public access ever, and these County Commissioners are telling me that our guests can’t use that same road in the winter to access our lodge? How does that make any sense?

As I was sitting there, feeling sorry for myself in the meeting, something incredible happened. The lawyer for the county, leans over and says to me something to the effect of, “Listen to the next application and how they handle the winter access danger issue.” Now, I really didn’t want to be in that room with these idiots anymore, but I decided to take his advice. In that presentation, the guy mentioned that winter access to their property would only happen with a licensed, experienced backcountry guide. The county commissioners seemed to be ok with that. I sat there stunned thinking, of course that’s the solution!!! Me, as an out of towner, can’t come up with anything related to avalanche safety that these people are going to take seriously. But……. If I can get local guides to take people to the house, how can they say no to that? The guides take people to WAAAY crazier places than the road to our house, and if they could make the call as to whether the conditions were too dangerous to access the house at any time, then the locals are making the safety decisions, not the out of towners!

We reached out to San Juan Expeditions, a local guide service, and told them that we wanted to partner with them to take people to and from our lodge in the winter, to make the County Commissioners happy. They agreed and I wrote up an agreement stating that they would be responsible for guiding our guests to the house in the winter. We began the application process again, getting unanimous approval from the County Planners, and then went in front of the County Commissioners. I was more nervous than I’ve ever been in my life, sitting in that room. I did my presentation, and the commissioners started debating. From the beginning, there was the young business owner guy who was very much for approval, arguing with the old timer who was against, who told a bunch of stories about how people have died in avalanches in the area. I sat there staring mostly at the 3^rd commissioner, trying to gauge by his expressions which was he was leaning. After a while, he said something that indicated that he was leaning towards allowing the project and I felt the biggest relief of my life!! Were we actually going to get approval this time?!? Then the final vote came, and we were approved, 2 for and 1 against!

At this point, we had already been working on this project for years and had spent over 30k on permits, studies, travel, etc… At first it seemed like we were so close to our dream, however as time went on we realized that we’d only cleared the first hurdle….

Next week, Bank HELL!!!!