Crystal Mountain, WA Reviews

In over half a century CM never charged for parking and offered a first rate ski experience adored by its faithful clientele. Then along came a corporate buyout by Aspen business gurus Alterra. The day lodge got a makeover with tagger art, decor suggestive of the I-5 express lanes through downtown Seattle. Now CM charges for parking and has raised the season pass rate by a staggering 70% since last year. Here on the plaza on a sunny Friday afternoon enjoying the nonexistent après ski scene, where we used to dance to live bands. Now the fireside cantina window closes hours before the lifts do. To get a beer requires climbing the stairs to the bull wheel bar, but don’t bother asking for a pitcher. Those got poured out with the new ownership. As my wife (who has skied CM since it opened more than 60 years ago) says of the new owners, “They’ve cut the heart out of the Crystal Mountain community.” The terrain is still 5-star. The experience has been reduced to 2-star.

The latest version of CrystalMountainWA requires a connection to their server before you can activate tracking. As most people who go to CM know, cell coverage is horrible. There have been days that I haven’t been able to load a session in order to start the tracking. The whole app is kind of a step backwards from the prior version.

When tracking does work, the details are pathetic. For each run it should give run/where, time of day, duration, avg speed and max speed like the prior version.

Needs lots of work on Weather and Forecast. The Parking tab is a dismay. I normally get “404-Something is off here.”

There are pretty new points to CrystalMountainWA, but it’s still just a window dressing on the web site, AND you’ve killed the webcam views and usability on iPad. Can’t view the resort map either because with location turned on, it crashes and closes out every time it realizes I’m not on the mountain. In a non app related suggestion…how about investing in decent webcams that provide clear images, affix them to something that won’t constantly be bumped, and actually fix the Midway cam that’s been frozen on the same image for weeks.

The previous app was much better before Alterra took charge. I try to sign in and does not work, I try to sign up again and says a missing field but all is filled in. You cannot zoom on webcams anymore. The map does not show all the runs - you have to go to the trail map. Rather click on the old app to get linked to the website. Much better functionality which is not how apps are supposed to work.

Links are broken from the detailed weather site to the long term forecast and Northwest Avalanche Center info. Temp data does not say what altitude or if summit, midway or base. Cannot enlarge the web cam sites now to see details. I would like to see overnight snowfall data, not just 24 hr snowfall. Wind speed “variable “ with no range is useless data. The NWAC does show this data if the link is restored.

Wow, CrystalMountainWA is garbage. When an app is less helpful than the website, then what is the point of having an app?! Key issues that are a MINIMUM feature set:

- grooming report (in text and map form)
- Trail maps
- full conditions report is “hidden” in some menu; why is this not in the main screen?! This is literally all we care about!
- ordering food screen is confusing! You can’t even get to the menus easily. So many pages just link you back to the website (which again, what is the point of an app)
- webcam screens have incorrect thumbnails showing

The new app adds a few features that could have been easily added to the old app. The new app is riddled with links that don’t work. They’ve buried common features that now require several clicks to get to. Until they fix it add web links to the Home Screen.

Love the new ski tracking feature and its accuracy. Thanks for making a great new app, Crystal!

Used to be able to see all webcams on one page.
Maps were better.
New app has broken links.
Many links just take you to the website version.

Had to reinstall as it keeps freezing. Will adjust if you fix the issues. Plz

The old app worked just fine, this new one is completely worthless. I’ve had it downloaded for 3 weeks now and every time I open it all it says for hours, trails status and weather is “not available”.

The prior App was easier to navigate. The large green map doesn't need to be at top. Web cam doesnr always work. Odd placement of links for web cams and mountain report

Map icon on bottom displays map with no trail information or anything useful. App crashed repeatedly when choosing this option. Web cams views are not scaleable or available in landscape mode.

Hard to find stuff

The 7day NOAA forecast was the best feature, and now it doesn’t work. Even trail maps won’t open. The only good thing is that you can still have the old app installed in parallel and just use that.

The old app currently works better. Any updates coming to fix the new one?

No obvious link to trail map. A link is buried in CrystalMountainWA that redirects to the website. The website link is not currently working.

The UI of CrystalMountainWA is more cumbersome than that of the previous app

The old version immediately showed the weather and the webcams. The new one incessantly bugs you to sign in and then fails to actually show weather or status. Ruined a decent app

Old app was better more user friendly way more information. New app is not good for active skiers more suited for Karen and her kids.

-Frequent delays in opening headings
-Have to click on webcams to view vs viewed on homepage
-Webcams only viewed individually vs being able to swipe across for rapid viewing
-Conditions and weather forecast not presented as well

I have nothing more to say other than CrystalMountainWA is horrible, please bring back the old app!