Another 'Summer at Timberline' Post

I realize there are a few posts about living in Govy and skiing all summer long, I believe I have read them pretty thoroughly but still have some questions for anyone that could possibly help answer.

I currently go to college in Portland, I am a sophomore this year. I drove out from MN this fall. I am trying to start planning out my summer early.

Here are some of the options I have put together:

1. Live with my girlfriend and possibly one other person in Portland. I am ok with around $500 a month for rent. I would potentially be driving to Timberline every weekday for skiing and work so that would add up to around $75 a week in gas money.

My original idea was to try and get a serving job at the lodge and work nights (3-11pm). That way I could ride all day and hopefully make a little bit of extra money off of tips. I worked as a barista for 4 years and I work with the IT department on campus so I have a good amount of customer service experience which could hopefully help land me a serving gig.

However, I realize that would leave me with hardly any time in the day to spend with my friends/gf. I would be getting back to Portland after midnight and would be driving up to Hood pretty early to ski.

2. Make the commute from Portland to Timberline, but instead work Park Crew/Digger/any job that allows me to ski and work during the daytime. Currently, this seems like the most attractive option to me, but I don't know all that much about working Park Crew on Hood during the summer. I realize I would be starting pretty early in the morning and probably working until mid-afternoon.

For anyone that has worked on the park crew at T-line in the summer, could you give me some info on what it is like? What are the hours like? Do you get to ski plenty? What's it like in general? What's the pay? I realize I wouldn't be making hardly any money, but I need to enough to pay the bills.

3. Work in Portland, either a barista/serving job, or get an internship (paid) somewhere. Studying physics, hopefully pursuing some sort of engineering in the future. Lots of paid internships/serving jobs at decent restaurants pay around $18-20 an hour so I would definitely make a lot more money. I wouldn't get to ski nearly as much (only on weekends) and I realize the summer pass would set me back about a grand.

In general are most of the homies riding on weekdays or on the weekend? Or every damn day at that? Hoping to meet some new friends and have some good times this summer. Probably taking a road trip out to Minnesota have way through August. Let me know if anyone has any tips, thanks.