it ends on June 5. Travel dates: August 25 thru (I think) Dec 17.

I put this out here for anyone thinking about an early season trip west. Baring trips on Frontier and/or Spirit (where no bags fly free), these fares will probably be the best you'll see for an early season trip.

Keystone is scheduled to open on October 31 (the earliest in at least a decade) with Breck opening on November 7. It'll primarily be man made, but it will be white.

Both Loveland and A-Basin will both probably open about 2 weeks before Keystone (snow dependent, of course).

Thanks for the heads-up.

But prices are OK, not a tremendous bargain. I've gotten better SWA prices for the early/mid December timeframe in recent years by booking 30-45 days in advance. It's a very slow travel period (in between T-Giving and Xmas.)

John, my experience has been that these fares are the lowest I've seen on the routings in every respectrive year;  ie sale fares offered this time last year were the lowest I saw for the fall of 2013.

Fares everywhere are up vs past years. If you hold out for what you've paid in the past, you're likely to be disappointed. I'd be surprised if the $258 round trip from the DC area to Denver fare does not turn out to be the lowest fare by a major airline that anyone will get for November/December travel.  (Spirit and Frontier fares might be lower, but you'll have to pay for carry on and checked bags, any beverages and an aisle or window seat bringing the total cost of the trip to a much higher price).

Then again, you pay your money and take your chances ...

Remember if a better fare comes along you can cancel your SWA flight and there is no penalty (unlike UAL AAL, DAL) - you just have to use the funds within a year of the time you booked the original ticket.

Travel dates I looked at were $300 - $350, not $260.

John, I just checked BWI/DEN. It was $258

To get the best fares, you can't travel on Friday or Sunday.

I'm still underwhelmed.

I was looking at IAD (traditionally cheaper to DEN than BWI, but not so for most other cities.) Cheaper BWI flights are non-direct or at bad times so that you need to use a travel day to/fro. For those of us who work for a living and want to save precious vacation time for PRIME season, BWI and IAD options right now are MEH. Not horrible, but MEH.

Nov/early Dec is still shoulder season. I don't go out West to ski the groomers. I need a better deal/convenience to book that far in advance.

Thanks for posting the heads-up, but I don't share your boosterism on this one.