Once your car is unpacked and resting in the heated garage, you won't need it again until it's time to go back to the real world. A significant element of Telluride's charm is its free year-round gondola transportation network. Walk around the grove of aspen and fir trees standing outside the 12 Trails Edge front door, and enter Town Hall Plaza. As the name implies, the mayor and his team operate the Mountain Village from their second floor offices above the Village's new gourmet grocery store.
The plaza also offers a coffee bar, a well-stocked liquor store, the town post office and a gondola station. From here, it is a 3 minute glide to the heart of the Village core, another 4 minute ride to Allred's Restaurant at the top of the ridge, and 11 minutes more to the town of Telluride. Go ahead—enjoy another glass of Pinot at La Marmotte, and rest assured the gondola will deliver you safely and silently back to your front door to end another incredible evening.
In the winter, pull your ski boots out of your personal locker and put them on by the fireplace downstairs, walk the half block to the end of the heated street, and slide under Lift 10 onto Double Cabins ski run. Or, in the summer, teach your daughter the finer points of fly casting at Elk Pond around the corner. Enjoy all season recreation as hiking and cross-country ski trails fan out in every direction from 12 Trails Edge.
"Nature is by and large to be found out of doors, a location where, it cannot be argued, there are never enough comfortable chairs."
— Fran Lebowitz