Check out our How to ride a SkiBike page regardless if you are going to take a lesson or not.
The short answer is yes, you can teach yourself how to ride, and yes, you are better off taking a lesson.
Confused? Let us clarify. Is it possible to teach yourself? Yes, it is. With that said, we STRONGLY RECOMMEND getting a lesson. There are some things that you will learn faster, easier and safer if you take a lesson. Things like how to stop, how to keep your speed in check, edging control, skidded turns, flat skidded traverse, sliding sideways down the fall line, etc. You have to learn to crawl before you can run a marathon. The last thing anyone needs is somebody who thinks they can teach themselves, get out of control with their speed or direction, hit another person and cause harm, and give the sport of skibiking a black eye. There are lot of mountains who don’t like us, and the last thing we need as a sport is for something like this to happen and give them reason to continue to not like us.
As the person writing this, I can tell you from personal experience that being self taught is not all that great. I received minimal instruction before I was handed a bike and was told, “Here you go. Have fun.” Even though I had other riders with me, none of them were able to give me guidance. I went by myself for the first handful of days and thought I was doing OK. Then one day I went up with Devin to teach one of my friends. He did the teaching and within five minutes of her lesson it became clear that I was not in fact doing OK. I was struggling at best. After two runs of receiving proper instruction my riding ability was improved immensely. So take it from me…do yourself and the sport a favor, and get a lesson from the get-go.