Taos ski valley. Some of the best terrain anywhere. a lot of snow in most el nino years (hopefully this one too) improving park that does need some work. i imagine rent would be pretty cheap in the town of taos. or you could to telluride, awesome terrain, better park, same thing with el nino, better ski town vibe but a lot more expensive. you wouldn't really need to drive at all living in telluride. i'd avoid summit if you don't like lines, gapers on vacation messing up the park( although there are a lot of really good people too) and powder that gets tracked out in one hour as apposed to taos and telluride where it lasts for days in the not so secret stashes and a lot longer in the hard to reach stashes. another option is durango then you are close to everything durango mountain resort, Wolf creek(TONS OF POWDER), telluride, silverton and the amazing backcountry of the san juans.
