All those who dreamt of a white Christmas in Colorado this year got what they wanted, and quite a bit more. At least on the Front Range.

It snowed… a lot. Denver International Airport shut down. Flights into Telluride and Montrose were cancelled. Visitors trying to reach resort destinations across Colorado were stranded in crowded airport concourses by the thousands over the Christmas holiday. And yet, by all accounts, the snows only served as a picturesque winter backdrop to a bustling holiday season here in Telluride.

“We were actually pretty amazed that the storm didn’t affect us hardly at all,” said Scott Spencer, general manager of Camel’s Garden hotel. Like many business operators in Telluride, Spencer reported that this holiday season was busy and booming – despite all the hype surrounding the DIA delays.

“We had very few storm-related cancellations,” said Kiera Skinner, director of sales and marketing for ResortQuest Telluride. In fact, she added, ResortQuest boasted a surprising number of last-minute bookings, filling nearly all 180 of the lodging company’s local properties.

The major winter storm that blasted the city of Denver on Dec. 20-21 shut down the airport, an important hub for ski resorts around the state, for a total of 45 hours. All flights from Denver into Montrose, Telluride, and other area airports were cancelled. Telluride Regional Airport Manager Rich Nuttall said that DIA allowed only two of the eight scheduled commercial flights to come to Telluride during the shutdown.

One week later, another storm blanketed Colorado’s Eastern Slope and led to a smattering of flight cancellations from DIA. And yet the Telluride Ski Resort and local hotels and restaurants on the whole did not appear to feel many negative effects caused by the holiday blizzards and subsequent travel glitches.

In fact, the Telluride Ski Resort reported that skier visits were up 10 percent over last year’s holiday season. Although precise skier numbers have not yet been released, Telski’s Sales and Marketing Director Matt Skinner said the ski area witnessed a three-day span between Christmas and New Year’s that will likely prove to be record-breaking.

“It was a very good holiday season overall,” he said. “The resort was only slightly affected by the storms, and thanks to the combined effort of many entities – from corporate airline companies down to local lodging operators – those visitors who were effected were still able to make it to Telluride for the holidays.”

Skinner estimated that only 10 percent of the visitors scheduled to visit Telluride this holiday were considerably delayed by the storms. Of those visitors, he calculated that 60 to 80 percent were still able to spend at least part of their holiday in Telluride.

A cross-section of the visitors to Telluride’s ski slopes this holiday showed three separate groups combining to create this season’s big numbers. Thanks to stellar snow conditions following the pre-Christmas storm, local skiers and boarders hit the slopes in hoards. Regional skiers comprised a large portion of this holiday’s total number of skiers as well, with many traveling from Grand Junction, Albuquerque, and Phoenix to make some powder turns during their Christmas vacations. Skinner added that the high regional skier numbers were likely the result of the fall’s successful regional sales drive.

Destination travelers comprised the third group of visitors to Telluride this holiday, and although some may have had to spend some uncomfortable extra hours in DIA, the majority were still able to get to Telluride to enjoy a wintry holiday.

Hotel Columbia owner Jim Lincoln said he didn’t see one single guest cancel due to the storm delay. “Some people showed up late, but no one didn’t make it,” he said.

The hotel’s Cosmopolitan Restaurant boasted record-breaking nights during the holidays as well. And like the hotel, the restaurant continued to see strong numbers the next week.

221 Oak Street restaurant manager Brent Englund witnessed a similar spike not only in holiday traffic, but also post-New Year’s. “We couldn’t have been much busier” during the holiday, he said, adding, “We did honestly wonder how people got to town – we expected more mayhem. But we’ve been full every night, and expect to be full for the rest of the week.”