Spider Mountain opens Jan. 18th as Texas’ first lift-accessed bike park

Written by Steve Fisher Dec 31, 2018 8:00 a.m. ET

Spider Mountain Bike Park, Texas, guy jumping

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Early in the new year, Texas is getting their first lift-accessed bike park. Set to open January 18^th2019, Spider Mountain will also be the USA’s only bike park that runs year-round (with a chair lift). The park is located in Burnet, Texas overlooking Lake Buchanan and the nearby Thunderbird Lodge and Event Center. One cool thing about this bike park is that it’s not part of a ski resort- this chairlift is only for bikes!

Designed and developed by Hogan Koesis, the park’s offerings include downhill flow trails and technical runs with bridges, berms, jumps, and other features. With over ten years of trail building experience, Koesis is now the director of mountain biking for Mountain Capital Partners, who operate Spider Mountain and several ski resorts.

One four-person chairlift will bring riders to the top of the park’s 350ft vertical. Currently the park has five downhill trails of varying difficulty and one perimeter trail, but Spider Mountain’s website states they have ‘an aggressive plan to add more trails regularly’.

Spider Mountain is located in the Highland Lakes area of central Texas. The bike park will be open Fridays through Sundays (plus holidays and spring break) from 9am to 5pm. Bikes and gear will be available for rent.

Near the bike park is Thunderbird Lodge and Event Center, a recreational facility that is also now owned by Mountain Capital Partners. The lodge offers accommodations, an event center, water sports (swimming, fishing, stand-up paddleboarding, boat rentals, a 15-slip marina and boat launch) and other amenities. There are 23 lodging units on-site, including lakefront cottages and a large luxury log cabin.

Spider Mountain Bike Park, Texas, rider in trees — *Photos courtesy of Spider Mountain

Lift tickets will cost $50 USD for adults aged 19-59, and $45 for all others. Introductory season passes will be available at $199 for adults and $149 for everyone else, giving you unlimited access from Jan. 18^th – April 30^th 2019. If you happen to hold a Power Pass, Power Card or Power Pack (multi-resort ski passes offered by Mountain Capital Partners) MTB access at Spider Mountain is now included.

With a new bike park on the way, only one question stands to be answered- Does everyone go bigger in Texas?

spidermountain.com

Steve Fisher

739 articles

Steve Fisher is a staff contributor for Bikerumor. Steve has been writing about trail, enduro and downhill mountain biking (plus a few commuter bikes) for seven years. Prior to that, Steve wrote for Whistler Traveller Magazine and Mountain Life Magazine. Steve is based in Pemberton, British Columbia, an area that offers plenty of challenging world-class singletrack and makes for great photos!

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5 years ago

“Spider Mountain will also be the USA’s only bike park that runs year-round”
is an absolutely false statement. Bailey and Windrock have been operating year round for several years now. Bailey might have been the first year-round bike park in the world. Both have way more trails and vertical than Spider.

Spider is the only one with a chairlift, which is probably what they were trying to say. Which is a great thing; especially if it proves that bikes can justify the cost of lifts. I guess we’ll have to wait and see how many people are willing to pony up $50 for a pass at a 350′ “mountain” with 5 trails.

Author

Steve Fisher

5 years ago

Reply to i

Hey i, you are correct- It’s the first year-round park ‘with a chairlift’. Sorry that was unclear, a small correction is now in place!

Exodux

5 years ago

Skypark in So. Cal has been running year around( weather permitting) for a couple of seasons now. Although Skypark is not lift serviced, it has a very gentle 400′ vertical “up trail” to get you to the top to start several downhill runs of every ability. There are also some xc loops.

GlazedHam

5 years ago

Angel Fire is about 12 hours away and Spider Mountain will be a .5 to 3.5 hours away for the tens of millions of people who live in Dallas, Houston, San Antonio and Austin. I’m going for the season pass at $199.

Jeremy

5 years ago

Did I understand that right. A $199 pass is only good for a little over 3 months?

5 years ago

Reply to Jeremy

Have you ever been to a bike park? That’s not out of line at all – season passes run generally $250 or more, a lot of places run memorial day to labor day. At $50/day, that pays off pretty quick.
Also, a season pass at any of my local ski areas runs almost $600; ski season is 3 months if we’re lucky. Plus skiing is boring compared to biking.

Derrrrrrrr

5 years ago

An hour from home and $200 for a season pass, sign me up

BankruptBiker

5 years ago

Why only open from Jan-April?

Drayton Jevas

5 years ago

Is there an option to not use the lift and earn your descents, by riding your bike to the top?
At most mountains it’s free to ride if u can get to the top. Just generally they are so big not many people do this.