On monday I was skiing at crystal with two friends and it was a descent 6" pow day. We skied most of the day and near the end of the day we took a long traverse and came up to a closed sign. We skied down along the rope line and decided to duck the rope in search of fresh snow. Keep in mind that this closed gate where the sign was can take you to a completely different area than the rope we were ducking. It's easiest to see on a trail map. Also I have skied Mt. Baker the last 5 years and ducking a rope is generally OK as long as there are no signs on the posts saying, "DO NOT ENTER." At crystal there were none of these signs.
We skied down along the ropeline and a ski patroller caught up to us and asked us for our passes and said they had photo evidence of us ducking the rope. After being "detained" for 2 hours, we finally got to go home. The patrollers were all pretty mean about the whole thing. They explained that they were bombing above, at the King, and that we were in a hazardous area. We were maybe 30 feet from the ropeline, which is next to an open run. Also keep in mind this is the same ski patrol that failed to do good avalanche control, which is why chair 6 was destroyed by an avalanche in 2014.
IKON pass pulled for a month.
Nowhere at crystal does it say that you cannot duck a rope. I have photo evidence of this. The day after, I was at Alpental and it explicitly says that you cannot duck a rope. I have photo evidence of this too.
I know I was in the wrong, but I've never received such harsh consequences. Should I try to combat this or just face the month of a pulled pass?
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