Winter pass at Smuggs

I have just confirmed an exchange for Smuggs in Feb. 09 & am confused on the winter pass fee for exchangers. Can anyone shed some light?It is difficult to interpret from the Smuggs website. Is this mandatory & if not is it worth purchasing considering we we will travelling with another family (5 kids ages 1,1,4,6 & 9). We won't be skiing every day. Also, we are staying in a 3 BR in Tamaracks if this makes a difference. Thanks.

We stayed at a 3 bedroom Tamarack after Xmas 07. It was great. We did get the Smuggs pass. They will give you a wristband for everyone in your room. That allows you access to the pools and fun zone. Of all the things listed, we only used the Funzone and bingo night. We paid for bingo cards any way. I don't think they check wrist bands. We have four kids age from 4 to 12. They all loved the FunZone. We used the North Village pool only. I don't think you need to buy the pass for it.

We only stayed for four night. They have a daily rate for the pass also. It was $26 a day if I remember right. You have to do the calculation to see if the pass actually saves you any. We did save some since we end up paying for 10 day camps. That alone saved us $150. We did not plan to have the kids in the camp every day. But they loved it so much that they kept asking to go back.

Your family will love Smuggs. We loved it so much that we considered buying there. Their sales offices was so busy that they could not fit us in for a tour.

congratulations on your exchange. We own in Tamaracks and really love the location - easy walk to the Fun Zone for the kids! And the North Hill pool is great for little ones.
You don't need the Smuggs Pass for the north hill Pool - your room key card gets you in to the building.
The Smuggs Pass is optional, but it is supposed to cover all the 'free' entertainment and activities in the resort (fun zone, village swim pool, campfire, tubing, indoor & outdoor evening events etc) though i've only ever seen them checking passes at the Fun Zone.
The cost of the Smuggs Pas per person is very low if there are quite a few of you in the unit. And you should save money with the discounts off lift passes, lessons, ski rentals, kids camps, treasures day care and in the shop even if you don't do many days skiing.
I think you buy the pass and get your wristbands at check in. I guess you could manage without it, but i wouldn't want to risk not being able to get access to an activitty with the kids. The wristbands were new last year (previously it was marked on your lift pass) and even owners had to have wristbands and we were checked, even though many of the staff know us.

(We didn't wear the bands on wrists though - too uncomfortable with jackets and gloves, so I kept mine in my purse with my key card, and the kids looped thiers onto their jackets with thier lift passes.)

Thanks for your responses. I guess we will have to plan our days & determine when we would use the pass & if it would be beneficial. Do you buy the pass per unit or per person? We would probably benefit from it as several of us will be renting , taking lessons & using the day care/kids camps.

This website has such wonderful information, I wish I knew about it before we bought our TS!

The pass is $179 plus tax and is per UNIT. One pass includes everyone staying in the unit.