Originally Posted by staehpj1

Care to elaborate? What lines does using an outfitter avoid? Does avoiding lines mean staying in different locations, eating in a different venue, and so on or just having them schlep your gear? I am not entirely clear on what services are provided by the tour organizers vs the outfitters.

Edit:
Also if lines are an issue, how dependent on when you ride is that (early riser vs late starter, etc.).

Someone mentioned 20,000 riders! Most of the pictures in this thread have only a few people to a few dozen at most. Is that because of time of day or because they are spread over a large area. The pictures look very uncrowded. Is that deceptive? Or is it possible to somewhat avoid the crunch at least some of the time.