Skiing in Park City

Ski Utah – Eaglin Ski Vacation

This year for the family vacation we decided we would go out west and see if the snow in Utah is really the greatest snow on earth. We had a red-eye flight on Sunday that got us into Salt Lake City around noon. As we picked up our rental car we asked the local folks how to get the best deals in Park City and immediately found out one great piece of advice – buy your lift tickets in Salt Lake. The Park City Mountain resort tickets in downtown Utah (which was essentially deserted on Sunday) were $56 compared to the best available price in Park City of $75. I was wanting to ski for all four full days that we would have to ski so we bought tickets and some goggles and were ready to head up to Park City (about 30 miles from SLC). Hint #1: By your ski passes in SLC and save some money.

The whole area had just gotten a solid blanket of snow (about 2 feet) over the weekend – and both Catherine and Anna were eager to play in this substance they were seeing for the very first time. They were able to basically completely soak themselves and spent even more time playing in the snow after we arrived at the hotel. The girls also learned another lesson about snow – it was water and it was cold, they quickly found this out as they soaked their clothes and had to endure the frigid temperatures. After a dinner at the local Pizza Hut we retired to bed early to get the girls to their ski lessons the next morning at 9 AM (mountain time, of course it was 7 AM by our East Coast time clocks).

The next morning the sun was shining and it was a beautiful 15 degrees with a high around 24 F. Excellent skiing weather. The girls had scheduled lessons starting at 9 AM that would keep them until 3 PM, about 5 hours of skiing with a break for lunch. I decided to work with Linda who was definitely a ski bunny and did a great job of moving down the bunny slope. Our one attempt at a slightly faster slope (also green) had her zooming down the hill pretty much out of control. At least I was able to ski beside her during this one exciting run and give her words of encouragement. After that she decided the bunny slope was just fine. Meanwhile Catherine and Anna were polishing their skills and Catherine’s natural athleticism was apparent as she mastered all the “green” level skills. Anna had a harder time mastering the skills – but I also new her general fearlessness would have her doing advanced slopes by the end of the week. By about 8 PM that evening 4 exhausted Eaglins were pretty eager to hit the sack and be ready for an early day of skiing the next morning.

The next day was a lot of fun and the girls got to exercise some real independence as we simply let them go. I stayed with them some as they mastered steeper and steeper slopes. Linda meanwhile practiced her wedge turns and stopping. I did break a way to take the two high speed lifts to the top of the mountain where I was awed by the view. The girls were still very apprehensive about the high speed lifts that seemed to take skiers off into nothingness (you could not see where they went after they crested the hill). We also committed at lunch to hearing the timeshare “pitch” for the Marriott resorts (they had 2) in Park City. We already have one time-share in Las Vegas so I am not adverse to the idea of purchasing time share. It is hard to gage them as an investment – but they have been instrumental in helping us choose great destination spots and getting good accommodations. My only complaint has been the “must decide today” tactic. Any enterprise that requires you to make a decision involving multiple thousands of dollars without giving time to think it over is best avoided (of course I say this have bought one timeshare before). In the end we ended up getting $100 towards dinner that night which we had at an excellent restaurant, Chimarro (of course the bill was more like $200 – which seemed pretty normal for the good restaurants on Main Street in Park City. Still the food and service were incredible.

Wednesday was yet another day of skiing. Anna finally decided that she was going to make the trip to the top of the mountain with me for some longer ski runs – though Catherine was still a bit timid around the large lifts. Catherine finally met up around lunch time with a friend she had made at ski school. They wanted to have lunch at the top of the mountain and the other girls father was pretty nice saying it was fine with him – if I was OK, and they were off to the Summit House. Linda was still doing her bunny slope loop – but getting much better, We all had lunch while Catherine was off with her friend, but after lunch Anna was yearning for some challenging runs. We did all the Green trails we could find on this side of the mountain. I was still a bit apprehensive about letting Anna on any advanced slope. Her style of skiing was to turn the skis downhill and try to go as fast as possible. She seemed to have good control and rarely fell, and even then only when attempting some trick. Still – the grade of slope we had been on was keeping her speed down and thus keeping her out of any serious danger. She had also had some trouble making the tighter turns on the narrow slopes. By the end of the ski day we were pretty tired and we met up with Catherine at the Summit on one of her runs. Her friends father was ready to hit some more challenging slopes – Catherine was still not quite ready for the blue slopes, and was being extra cautious after taking some hard spills on the more advanced green slopes she had tried. After that we did a few more easy runs (you can get almost 4 miles of continuous skiing in a single run at Park City). We decided to retire to the hotel and get ready for the highlight of the vacation.

Wednesday evening Linda had scheduled us for a sleigh ride to the “Snowed Inn” lodge where we would have a cowboy dinner. We met at the bottom of the mountain for the short sleigh ride to the inn (visible about ¼ mile up the mountain). The ride, though short added an incredible ambience to the entire experience and our driver was great (we had our one sleigh even though there were about 50 folks going up for dinner). The Inn had a roaring real wood fire and waiters and waitresses in full cowboy gear bustling about. A cowboy was playing guitar and singing country music and we were greeted with warm mugs of cider as we were led to our table. Shortly the chef, also fully decked in cowboy gear, rang the dinner bell and told us the menu of soup, chili, filet mignon, chicken, trout, and assorted sides. The food was good, but the real pleasure was the atmosphere. With the cowboy and crowd singing Christmas tunes, the fire, the full surroundings, I simply sat back – warm and happy and took it all in. It was too soon when our sleigh had to take us back down the mountain, there is something to be said about a full belly and a warm fire. The dinner was probably the most expensive I had ever had (at about $80 a head) – but it was worth the experience for all of us and was one of the real highlights of the trip. We took the bus back to our hotel and quickly crashed for the evening. Thursday would be our last day in Park City and I was looking forward to another full day on skis.

The next morning Linda and Catherine decided they would rather shop (Park City has a lot of really cool shops on their main street) while Anna and I were going to ski. By this time Anna was ready to tackle pretty much anything I wanted to do. We made a few runs mixing green and blue slopes and pretty much decided the Home Run green level slope was the most fun when done “our way”. Our way consisted of taking the green portions of the run and at certain points “shortcutting” down unmarked blue level cuts through the trees. We would hurtle down these powdery paths and rejoin the green slope at a spot down-mountain, effectively cutting off portions of the green trail. Some of these were quite steep (aka nearly vertical at least at the start) and we had some hilarious falls into the deep powder. Anna’s bindings were quite loose and at one point one of her skis flew off making a beautiful arc through the air spearing into a snow drift backwards with a nice loud “poing!” Anna was fine on each of these – though I had one scare as I was hurtling back onto the green, a lady decided the point where I would re-enter the green trail was a good place to stop and rest. I flattened my body out (I was hurtling straight downhill) and skidded to a stop at her feet on my rear. One of the safety patrol just happened to be there and commented “nice stop” which was of course preferable to wiping out the poor girl.

Anna had wiped out on the same run, but as soon as we were on our feet we hurtled down the hill at full speed laughing about the way we both had flown through the air. We next decided to try a few more advanced slopes and for the first time we were going to be getting onto the small 2-person old-style lifts. The big difference in the old style lifts are (1) there is no safety bar, and (2) it does not slow down as it approaches you. I had learned on this type of lift – but the first time the chair hit Anna in the rear she slid forward and I found myself grabbing her and hoisting her onto the chair with one hand while I gripped the back of the lift chair with the other hand. She of course loved the lift because after you became airborne it would swing back and forth drunkenly. We did successfully learn to mount the lift – but got to have another scare as a small boy in the chair in front of us did not successfully get seated and fell about 20 feet into (thankfully) a snow bank. Of course everything came to a halt – but after it was determined the boy was OK, he was back on the lift and we were off again.

By this time Anna was pointing to some slopes that she wanted to try, one of which was Black. She had solidly made it down a few blue slopes and the black slope was boxed up on both sides so there was no chance of her dropping off the mountain so I decided to let her try it. On the approach to the black slope she somehow got up onto a ridge which required her to do a free drop of about 8 feet and also where I had to catch her to prevent her do about another 10 feet of free drop. She actually managed the drop well and stayed on her skis. I was apprehensive – but we were also committed, the only way to avoid the slope at this time was to go back up the hill. I coached her a bit, “keep your speed down and stay in control”, “go across the hill not straight down”. I might as well been talking to a tree – she saw the drop – turned her skis into it and was off. The initial drop was shallow (about a blue level) – but it was deceptive as there were deep moguls the entire way down. She read the slope fine, but was not prepared for the terrain. For about 50 yards she bounced up and down like a poor rider on a trotting horse. Her hat flew off, then one glove somehow came loose and flew into a drift. She landed on her rear and skidded the remaining 150 yards until the slope leveled out. I hurriedly headed down, scooping up both the hat and glove on the way down. As I reached Anna at the bottom worrying about how the experience would leave – I soon realized I need not worry. I was greeted by her wide smile and “That was awesome! – lets do it again!” Realizing that she was truly enjoying this we went full blast to the lift and headed right back up. The second time down was pretty much a repeat of the first run, but no less fun. At least this time she kept her hat and glove! It was getting late – so we did one last full mountain run, racing each other through the steep parts.

During the day we had incredible luck, the one time we got stuck on a lift (Silverlode) it was directly above the downhill trick race course and we got to see a race from the best vantage point possible – directly above it !) Getting a chance to spend an entire day skiing with my 8 year kid was great. It probably will not be long until they are ready to take off with their friend and leave boring old dad behind, but for now we can still race and stand on the edge of a precipice daring each other to go first. After the last run we bid the mountain farewell, called Linda and then headed back to the hotel. That night we ate at Grub Steak – another excellent restaurant.

Park City is awesome, flying into Salt Lake – you can drive there (highway the entire way) in about 30 minutes, or you can take a shuttle bus. Once there, you can get anywhere in the city in minutes, and with 3 incredible resorts within a few miles (Deer Valley, Park City Mountain Resort, and Canyonlands) it is a ski paradise. We hope to get back as soon as possible and enjoy more of the “greatest snow on earth.”