PSA: The new permit system for the Enchantments is a total mess

Honestly, tried to get a walk up permit for the Colchuck Lake zone last weekend and the ranger station was a zoo. They changed the lottery to a 6am online drop that crashed twice, and people who drove for hours got nothing. Has anyone actually had luck with the new setup or is it just broken?

4 comments

4 Comments

victor7793mo ago

Ugh, it feels like they just moved the chaos online. I mean, a crashed website at 6am is somehow worse than a long line, because now you waste a trip for nothing. Maybe they should just go back to the old walk up system but with more rangers.

the_wendy3mo ago

Honestly, my flight booking did that last week.

cole_baker3mo ago

It's just a website crash, not a national emergency. People act like they've never seen a server go down before.

milarodriguez1mo ago

Oh yeah @the_wendy I feel you on the flight booking thing, it's like every online system these days has a meltdown at the worst time. For the Enchantments lottery, what actually worked for me last year was getting a group together and all of us trying for different zones at the same time. Me and my buddy both had our phones and laptops going at 5:55am, refreshing like crazy, and one of us actually got through for the Stuart zone while the other got nada. It's a total pain but having backup people trying helps spread the luck around, especially if you can coordinate with friends who have faster internet or live closer to a big city server. Still sucks that you have to game the system just to get a permit though.