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Hotel costs for the upcoming season

2562 Views 34 Replies 19 Participants Last post by  Al Hansen
FYI. The cost of our hotel for a upcoming hunt jumped 50% per day. Hang on to your wallets guys this hoby / habit is getting expensive. Cost in every area has really jumped. Primers, bullets, powder , gas and now hotels. Ouch !!!!!!
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The saying of hunting becoming a "rich mans sport" is happening faster than I thought it would. I'm kinda hoping I don't draw tags this year.
I'm kinda hoping I don't draw tags this year.
It's not too late to ensure that happens.

Yes, costs are going through the roof. And things like hotels are the type of things that when they go up, they stay up. Try Air BnB or VRBO in the area. You may find a little better deal there. You also might not.
I have decided on the cost of things that if you want to go and do something then go and do it and not to worry about the cost.

This past February on our hunting trip to Arizona we didn't have a motel room since quite a few were still shut down due to covid. We had been staying at a friends home but he passed away in 2020 so we were out of luck there. I just got all the old camping gear out of the garage and started to pack it into the truck. Then at 1pm the day before we were to leave one of the motels that I had called called me and said that they had a room, so all the camping gear came out of the truck.

What it comes down to is that if you want to go just go and don't worry about the cost. If there is a problem with the cost then quite likely you can't afford to go in the first place.
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These cost jumps are more related to inflation in general than hunting itself. Heck just driving an hour from home has become a "rich mans" activity! I travel quite a bit for my work and have noticed the cost of EVERYTHING has gone up. Hotels, meals, fuel, flights, rental cars.... It never ends. I actually made plans to only hunt close to home this year rather than doing the long pull of the 5th wheel several hours away. Put my boys in for limited entry only, bought points for general season deer and told them we'd hunt spike elk near our home on one of the hunts. We'll see how it all pans out.

With the cost of food jumping so bad, I get anxiety every time I get a direct deposit from work. Because I know that my wife is going to want to run to Costco shortly thereafter.

In reference to hunting again, as Jeff Foxworthy so eloquently put it, this deer meat is the finest meat on planet earth! Its more expensive that the finest cuts of beef!
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What it comes down to is that if you want to go just go and don't worry about the cost.
There is a big difference between "wanting" to do something and being able to afford to do something.

If there is a problem with the cost then quite likely you can't afford to go in the first place.
I could give you a list of 100 things very quickly that I absolutely want to do, but probably never will or at least won't right now because of the cost. Don't mix these things up!
Haven't we heard a neverending chorus of whining here about point creep and overcrowding? Isn't this a tiny silver lining in the perpetual gloom and doom?

While there are limits, one will find a way to do the things that are priorities and make cuts on stuff on the periphery of interest.
Where are you talking about?
FYI. The cost of our hotel for a upcoming hunt jumped 50% per day. Hang on to your wallets guys this hoby / habit is getting expensive. Cost in every area has really jumped. Primers, bullets, powder , gas and now hotels. Ouch !!!!!!
FYI. The cost of our hotel for a upcoming hunt jumped 50% per day. Hang on to your wallets guys this hoby / habit is getting expensive. Cost in every area has really jumped. Primers, bullets, powder , gas and now hotels. Ouch !!!!!!
I am dreading my Turkey hunt now, and honestly will probably only be able to pull off Ducks this fall with the rate things are going. I was excited to start getting my 9 y/o more involved this year, but I think I'll push off his hunter safety one more season in case I can't pull things off.
We'll definitely be avoiding Fri & Sat night stays when possible but that's always been the case.

But I'm curious, the site I saw comparing April 2019 to April 2022 show hotel prices are down from the nationwide and for most chains. They jumped between late 2020 to now but that was an increase from plummeting costs during the first 6 months of the pandemic. The caveat looks like reward points which have lost noticeable value.

Are people paying more than they did in 2019 or just more than the deal busters from 2020?
Where are you talking about?
Just guessing but the middle of nowhere Montana.
We took our annual spring trip a couple weeks ago down to Boulder/Escalante. Four of us rented a 2 room suite at the boulder mountain guest ranch. Definitely not a 5 star hotel but I've seen much worse. It had a fridge, toaster oven, filtered water, hot water dispenser and best of all - no tv. Paid $106 a night for the four of us. I was really shocked at how reasonable gas prices were. Only about .20 cents more than salt lake prices. Food was probably the most eye raising, prices were alot more expensive than I thought they would be.
Yup. Nowhere Montana for 13 days.
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It's not too late to ensure that happens.

With the reduction of permits in areas, I may not need to withdraw my app.
Yup. Nowhere Montana for 13 days.
Sounds incredible! How rounds do you go through in that time?
I have had a ton of incidental costs come up lately such as new tires for the car and what have you. Each expense that comes up seems to be significantly more expensive than it was the last time I blinked my eyes too. Now, just as I'm getting ready to do my spring Idaho bear hunt, I get my taxes done and Uncle Sam decided I'm not fully paid up on the extortion money. When I was a kid I thought only rich people still owed taxes at the end the year. Who would have ever thought I would grow up to be "rich" someday? Yo, Adrian, I did it! 😒
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Two years ago the two of us went through 4000 rounds each. Last year we shot 1500 rounds each.
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Good news. Game on !!! We tried to bargain with the hotel but they wouldn't budge , so we booked with a hotel that we use to use several years ago for the same price as last year.
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Two years ago the two of us went through 4000 rounds each. Last year we shot 1500 rounds each.
I don't think I've shot a rifle 1500 times in my entire lifetime! 😲
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We both take 3-5 rifles each and rotate them when they get hot. This year it will be : 1 17 HMR, 2 20 Practicals and 1 .204.
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