Experience Park City Ski Resort

Park City Ski resort has two adjacent ski areas - the Mountain village and Canyon Village, and it is the largest ski and snowboard resort in United States.  The two ski areas are connected by a Gondola and a two way lift. Compared to ski resorts at Colorado, the mountains here are not tall. The resort has a base at elevation 6800 ft, the tallest peak at the resort is the Jupiter Peak at elevation of 10,026 ft, the tallest point lift can reach is 9,998 ft. The peaks are about at tree lines, as they are covered by trees as far we can see.

trail map

There are many lodging options at the resort, we stay at a rental property across the mountain village parking lot, and of course much more economical than ski in-n-out apartments, with added 5 minute walk to the slopes.

Narrow Steep trail between trees

We started our first skiing there, with Nicholas, from Crescent Express lift, which serves blue and black trails. From top of the lift, we saw an expansive rolling hills in front of us. Our first run was on a blue trail, silver queen, which is not wide, and very steep. Nicholas took off right away and disappeared from sight in seconds.  Lily was a little bit intimidated, she was hesitant at the start, and fell before she gained speed.  She got up on her own quickly and started downhill. I was a bit tight myself but had no issue to gain speed downhill.

On top of the mountain

Nicholas went on to ski on his own and Lily and I skied from Crescent Express one more time to enjoy the slope before went on to Bonanza Express which serves higher mountains and got away from beginners. Bonanza serves mostly blue trails and the longest trail in the mountain, Homerun, a green trail, 3.5 mile long. The tops of Bonanza Express, Silverlode Express, Motherlode Express converge at the same peak,  wit access to Thayanes lift, King Kong Express and SilverStar. These lifts all serve the right hand side of the Bonanza, with a mixture of green, blue and black trails. It is noted that King Kong serves only blue and green trails, and is a more crowded lift.

Trees on Park City Slopes

We stayed there for the rest of the day and enjoying the thrill of speed on the blue trails, and stopped from time to time to take pictures of the vista and ourselves! We also skied on Homerun before lunch to get a worry free, no slow-down  skiing downhill - of course the terrain will slow one down - it is a green trail after all. 

We rode the gondola to the iron mountain late in the afternoon, the area between mountain village and the canyon village, skied down white pine trail, and cascade trail. We had to take iron mountain express right away to return to Gondola - since the Gondola would be closed around 3:30 pm. However we did not get to the Gondola until 4 pm due to the pause of  running of the lift (likely due to skiers related incident). We took the last lift of Silverlode up mountain and enjoyed the high speed downhill run one last time for the day. When we returned to the base, all lifts were closed and in fact both our boys returned to our rented apartment already - a first in our skiing history. 

Another steep descend 

We intentionally did not attempt black trails, trying to minimize potential of injury. Without the stress and sweat of skiing on black trails, we were of full of energy until the end of the day.

Iron Mountains

The second day we skied, on left hand side of Bonanza first - Pioneer, McConkey's Express before going to Canyon Village. We took the Payday Express up and transferred onto Bonanza Express, and ski to the base of McConkey's. McConkey's serves the edge of mountain village ski area, the area has a totally different feel, had much fewer skiers, and the trails there are mostly black trails. There is only one blue trail GeorgeAnna going down hill. Despite clam weather at the base, it was very windy at the top of McConkey's, which is near Jupiter peak - it was almost a white-out! Braving the strong wind, we ran twice on this trail. We skied toward Canyon village, via Gondola.

Near Jupiter Peak

Braving the white-out

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The gondola

The the first stop of the Gondola is at the peak of a mountain, and the view from there was beautiful,  like the names of the lifts imply - Dreamscape, Dreamcatcher and Daybreak. A unique feature of iron mountain ski area is that there are many cabins there, and there is a road on the slope. For this reason, there are a few overpass or underpass for ski trails.

It was so beautiful, we stayed in the iron mountain area without going to the rest, and the main part of Canyon village. Again we enjoyed mountain until it was closed for the day!

Deja Vu 

on the slope

Cross the road via an underpass

Cabins on the slope - picture taken from lift

Sunset occurs early in the mountains

The third day at Park City was a gloomy day, we went straight to Canyon Village via the Gondola, Timberline two way lift and then over-and-out two way lift, the ride took us more than 30 minutes! The mountains at this side of ski resort are much lower, the slopes are shallower. The gloomy weather plus some creepy names of the lifts - like tombstone express, orange bubble, made us not feel so good. We visited these lifts, plus Sun peak, and Saddleback, skied for a couple of hours and went back to Iron mountain area via Peak 5 lift, instead of the slow two way lifts of Timberline and over-and-out, for the rest of the day, after lunch at Miner's Camp.

It started snowing, the mountain turned dark early, we could barely see the trails while going high speed downhill. We went to the base, and call it for the day around 3 pm.

Low mountain

 

Orange Bubble Lift

Park City in the Snow, January 5th, 2020 

Great snow conditions, two beautiful sunny days out of 3 days there, uncrowded mountains, great food and service of restaurants (Summit House, Cloud Dine and Miner's Camp) in the mountains, plus that we took it easy by staying on blue trails and green trail to enjoy skiing and the mountains,  it had been a great ski vacation for us. We will come back for another run!

Lessons from Trivia in Daily Life

Many things in daily life are trivial, but lessons from them are not.

1) Soak hoses

The soak hoses around our house, which is used to water the soil near foundation,  was frequently damaged by the contractor who mows our yard - once or twice a season. It was annoying even though he reimburses us for each replacement we purchased. I tried to remind him be careful but he still cut hoses once or twice a season. 

What else could I do to prevent it from happening? I thought about it and decided to help him on this: to raise the hose above the ground on the mowing day. We spent time to set up the anchoring points  -  nails on the wall. After this, the hoses have not been damaged any more. It also helped me to avoid the annoyance and extra chore. 

I frequently monitor and (when necessary) supervise contractor's work at my house to solve the problems they were hired to solve! It costs me some time and causes inconvenience, but overall it helps ensure quality, avoid rework, minimize annoyance, it helped me a lot.

2) Make a little extra efforts to save a lot time

It is very time consuming to deal with Texas DPS (department of public safety) about anything. The trueID requirement makes the situation worse. One colleague spent 6 hours in line to have his driver license  renewed for a trueID. 

To minimize wait time, DPS created a "get inline online" system, which only applies for the same day appointment. The online appointment starts at 7am, and the appointments are gone in minutes, getting an appointment is like winning a lottery as DPS employees say.

This past winter break, I experienced the same trouble when trying to make an appointment to renew Nicholas' driving permit and my driver license. Initially I tried to make online appointment right at 7am, it took 5  - 10 minutes to get a response for every click I made, and in the end I was told there was no appointment time left for the day. 

After a couple of failed attempts, I decided to get online later, at 7:30am for example, to make appointments at service centers 20 - 30 miles away from metropolitan areas. I got two appointments, one at McKinney, one at Terrell. With extra 10-20 miles drive, it was still hard but much easier to get the appointments there than at those in the metropolitan area. With appointments, the total time at DPS was ~ 1 hour, vs. 3-6 hours waiting in the line.

3) Perennial blooming plant 

We have this resilient plant on a window sill, it blooms year round.

A few times last year, we realized we had not watered it for long time since it withered and leafs turned brown. With heavy heart, we poured a couple cups of water into the pot, and that resurrected it each time.

All it needs is the sunshine through the window and some water every week. We now water it weekly, and it blooms again and again after previous flowers withered. One cup of water, no more guilty feeling!

4) Clean restroom

My office is in a two story building - first story rooms are mostly offices, and second story is for a training center - which is not used all the time. First story has one set of restrooms, second story has another set.

One issue with the 1st floor restrooms is that they are heavily used, especially men's room. At peak hours it is full, stinky, and not so clean from time to time. 

I actually use the restroom on the second floor most of the time. With a few more steps, I have a clean, cool restroom all for myself most of the time! 

5) Forming good habits saves worries and time

When there was an incident in the neighborhood - e.g. thief walked into someone's house to steal, everyone became panic, installing security system, asking for more police patrol ... the fact is that all the victims needed to do is to remember lock the house even when they are in the house, especially when they are about to sleep.

Recently there is coronavirus from China - people got panicky. Not only Coronavirus can kill, more common influenza virus can kill as well.  The key is to have a good habit - have vaccine each season, wash hands before eating, sanitize  hands after shaking hands with people, rest and drink a lot of water... they seem like a lot chores, but if one forms the habit of doing them all the time, they are just part of your routine like breathing!

There are numerous examples in this category  -  place stuff (e.g. keys) in the same place so you don't have to look for them later; eat healthy so you don't have to worry about weight gain or high cholesterol .....

Helping others to help yourself,

Incur some inconvenience to be convenient,

Spend some time to save time,

...... sounds like oxymoron ... they are shortcuts in life!

Ski Park City – Enjoying cozy family time 😊 – By Lily

On the first day of the new decade, we headed to Park City Utah for our family vacation. Despite the late hour and a light snow falling at Park City, we got to our destination smoothly. Our apartment was conveniently located across the street from Park City Mountain Resort entrance, so just a few minutes of walk to the lifts.

Park city Mountain Village  - entrance to the slopes

On the 2nd day, Justin was eager to test out his demo skis (with the intent to purchase) and hit the slopes right away. While the rest of us secured our rentals, took care of the groceries and got familiarized with our surroundings. Allan and I went to Antelope Island state park to see the Great Salt Lake in winter. It definitely looked different than what he saw a few weeks back in November. The lazy winter sun added a layer of mystery to the lake, making it hard to distinguish snow vs. salt, making the vastness of the lake more impressive.

Winter at Great Salt Lake 

The next day turned out to be a gorgeous day with blue sky and cozy sunshine. We all hit the slopes. Since Allan and I are no match to the kids for speed and skills, we took the easier blue trails while the two boys skied all over the mountains. We had lunch together every day to have some time together while in the mountains. Each day we went to a different restaurant on the mountain, Summit house, Cloud dine, and Miner’s camp. I was very impressed by the services at all restaurants. The food was on the pricier end, but the menu was good! There was never long waiting lines, we could always find a table, and people here are very conscientious about minimizing waste and protecting the environment. At lunch time, we traded information about the lifts and trails and joked about our falls 😉

On the slopes at Park City

Every day Allan and I skied until the lift closed and finding the kids already crashed at the rental house. Once “home”, I would make some tea, prepare some fruits, and we would watch football together. With a small apartment, everyone was in the same room making conversations so much easier. For a moment I wished we could have this kind of intimacy everyday at home. Both boys are into cooking and they are both very good at it! So we took turns to cook dinners, salmon, chicken, steak. We hustled and bustled in the small kitchen giving each other a hand. Every single meal was way better than the night we had dinner out at a local Thai restaurant (yeah, that was a wrong pick!). 

at Vacation home

food we cooked

Time to head home after five days. We bid our goodbyes at the airport and headed to different directions. I guess this would be our new norm, family time during vacations only.

Ski Utah - trip plan

After a hiatus of family ski vacation in 2019, we got right into it at the start of 2020! The whole family went to Park City at Utah to ski.

Ski vacation is expensive; our philosophy is to spend as needed and to save when possible while maintaining the quality of the vacation.  However savings from several big ticket items, i.e. airfare, lodging, ski rental and lift tickets, are possible when carefully planned.

Airfare/Airport parking - we chose to leave DFW on January 1st, New Year's Day, on a 9pm flight, return on Monday January 6th at 9 am from Salt lake city. These days of the week and times of day, not only allow us to get better airfare, but also help us to beat local traffic. Airfare plus prepaid airport parking saved us ~ $500.

mountains near great salt lake

Itinerary -  in the past we typically allotted 5 days for ski trip, two days on the road,  ski 3 days. This time due to the flight schedule, we allotted 6 days, four days at the destination, but only ski three days, with one day for rest. We arrived at the apartment near midnight of January 1st , and rested on Jan 2nd   - we went grocery shopping first, and then Lily and I went to Great Salt Lake , about 1 hour drive from the ski resort, for an excursion.

snow covered great salt lake

snow covered salt flat

Lodging - Ski-in and ski-out is ideal but super expensive at Park City mountain village. We rented 

an apartment with kitchen and 2 full bath in a building across a parking lot from the ski resort, about a quarter mile from the lifts at the base of the slopes - we could walk to the lifts in about 5 minutes! we saved ~ $1000 without sacrificing conveniences too much.

back of the apartment building we stayed

Ski lift tickets and ski rentals - we bought the lift tickets ahead of time, online through a EpicMix program - which offered close to ~ 40% discount compared to tickets at the window. We rented skis, boots, poles and an helmet from a independent shop, Jake's ski rental, which was at ski resort but not on the main traffic path. Total saving was ~ $720.

Food - food is expensive at and near the ski resort, and even more so when we lunch at the restaurants in the mountain, a burger with fries is ~ $20 - 25! We ate in the mountains during our ski days, but cook dinners for 3 nights. This saved us ~ $200 and an added bonus was that cooking kept us away from cellphones and laptops, we had more real "together" time.