Tubing at Peek N Peak

The snow had been falling at a good clip, so we decided to take the kids tubing. They haven't done this in our area before, though they did go tubing when we took a trip to Park City a couple of years ago. Neither boy could remember having done it, though, so it was a "new" and exciting thing to do.

Unfortunately, we forgot the simple fact that it was President's Day weekend. Apparently, everyone in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Western New York goes snow tubing on this holiday. The line to get a lift ticket was impressive. In actuality, they oversold the hill.

We were lucky enough to get onto the tubing hill before they had sold too many tickets. Soon, there were far more people on the hill than there were tubes. The staff was extremely unhelpful and told people to take tubes from those who already had tubes as they came down the hill.

You can imagine how popular this was: an adult taking a tube away from a little 5 year old child, or harassing other adults to get a tube for a run down the hill.

Large groups of people began leaving and asking for a refund. Some of them had driven hours to go snow tubing. We tried trading off tubes, but once you let your tube go, it was nearly impossible to get one back. Fortunately, the crowds thinned considerably as people left and demanded refunds. We had gotten to the hill in the nick of time, and were ahead of the insane rush.

We did have a great time, but the stress and people begging/bullying/pleading for tubes was awful (especially after paying $54 for two hours of sledding time). Next time, we'll go to Holiday Valley or to a new little tubing hill in Warren, PA. The staff at Peek N Peak was completely apathetic and did nothing to facilitate the exchange of snow tubes as people came down the hill.

The kids absolutely loved sliding down the hill, so the hassle was worth it in the end. They laughed and yelled and shouted for a full two hours of sliding time. When our time was up, we headed back to our car and took two happy (and tired) boys home.