Park CIty New Years 2010
The last four years for New Years we have booked a hotel room in downtown Minneapolis. This is kind of fun, we have dinner, have some drinks, usually end up at Brit's enjoying the band. We get up the next day and have breakfast at Hell's Kitchen. Not too terribly exciting but it works for us.
We have been going Salt Lake City the last three years to visit Karen's brother and his family and we usually try to ski one day while we are there. We decided to change up our new years routine this year and spend new years in Park City and visit Jerry and his family after skiing.
We flew into Salt Lake on New Years Eve day. I love Hotwire.com, I have gotten great deals on hotels over the years and I have also gotten great deals on rental cars. I booked the rental car through Hotwire, it was about $130 for four and a half days. We got a little Corolla, with the floor mats removed of course, because of the Toyota recall. We felt kind of bad because we tracked a lot of dirty snow and slush onto the new carpet but there was not much we could do about it.
We drove directly to Park City from the airport. We got a little lost finding our condo because of the crappy GPS software for my Palm but we eventually found it. Copper Bottom Condos are located in the same building as Chez Betty several blocks away from the ski area. The building looked a little dated from the street but our condo appeared to be recently renovated. It was nice; granite counter tops and two flas screen TVs. We did encounter two problems with the condo, the windows were extremely drafty, you could feel a cool breeze in the livingroom and it was nearly impossible to adjust the water temperature in the master bathroom, something was wrong with the faucet.
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| From Park City 2009 |
We unpacked and drove to Old Park City for lunch and to locate Cafe Terigo, where we had reservations for that evening, we walked up Main Street until we found it. We had lunch at what appeared to be a nice little Mexican restaurant called Zona Rosa. I hate when I go to a real Mexican restaurant and the food cannot measure up to the fast food at Chipolte. This was the case with Zona Rosa, the food wasn't terrible but it wasn't spicey at all, I would have preferred Chipolte. After lunch we walked around town for a while until Karen complained that it was cold, so we went back to the room. I thought it was odd that Karen though it was cold, it wasn't that bad but it turned out to be a foreboding of things to come.
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| From Park City 2009 |
We went back to the condo to rest before stuffing ourselves with New Years dinner. We changed and then returned to Main street in Old Park City for dinner. Cafe Terigo was packed but we were seated immediately. We chatted with a couple sitting next to us, the guy had just moved from LA to Salt Lake City. I couldn't help but wonder if he is prepared for the culture shock. The food and service was excellent. Towards the end of dinner Karen just stopped talking to me. I wondered if I said something wrong. What the heck was going on? I finally asked her and she said that she was feeling terrible, congestion, sore throat, sinus headache and it came on during dinner. Karen being chilled earlier in the day started to make sense, she was acutally starting to come down with a sinus infection earlier in the day but it did not hit her until dinner. Karen did a little research later on and found out that that altitude can cause a sinus infection to rapily worsen and that is exactly what happened.
We started out the new year at Snow Creek Medical Center. Karen had the worst sinus infection of her life, she barely felt well enough to get dressed and drag herself to the clinic. We arrived when the clinic opened. Most of the other patrons were parents with sick kids, ages from toddler to teen. They quickly got Karen admitted. I decided that as long as I was there I would get my H1N1 flue shot. I tried to get one when I went to Bolivia but the vaccine had not been released to the general public yet. I actually save $3.00 by getting the vaccine in Park City, it would have cost me $18 in Minneapolis but it was only $15 in Utah. That is the only upside to spending new years morning in the clinic.
We went back to the condo so Karen could rest and recouperate. I make a inadequate nurse but I did my best to make Karen comfortable. At noon she told me she would be fine and I should go skiing for the rest of the day, so I did. We had prepaid the lift tickets and ski rentals so it was nice to get half a days use for one of us.
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| From Park City 2009 |
I had skied here about twenty years ago so the trails were vaguely familiar. The front side of the mountain was busy so I headed the backside and skied the runs from the Motherlode and Silverlode lifts. It was nice, I did not have to wait for a lift all afternoon long. Of course I made the classic mistake of looking at a mogul run from the chairlift and thinking I can ski that. When when I did I skied two moguls and stopped and skied two moguls then fell etc... I am not a great mogul skier.
I remembered Home Run from twenty years ago. It runs under the Bonanza lift and it is a cruiser run that is perfect for the last run of the day, steep enought to gain some speed, no moguls and just enough turns and twists to keep things interesting.
I rerurned my equipment to Aloha Ski Rental at the end of the day. Past years we had rented with Utah Ski and Golf and the only problem we had was they gave me a pair of boots that smelled so bad that I had to exchange them for another pair and they reaked before my feet even touched them! The equipment that we got from Aloha seemed newer and in better condition. The Aloha Ski personel were more personable than Utah Ski and Golf, not that there is a problem with the people at Utah Ski, the people at Aloha are just a little friendlier. Just an FYI, if you are new to skiing in Utah, you can buy your lift tickets in Salt Lake City (Utah Ski and Golf) and save about 20% or more. We paid $118 each for a two day lift ticket.
I went back to the condo and I would have loved to soak in the hot tub to warm up but the condition of the hot tub was well out of my comfort zone and I am not a germaphobe. The tub looks like it might be from the '70s and the water was a little foamy and clear enough for me to get in.
Karen was wiped out from her sinus infection so I got takeout from a local Thai palce for dinner. Going out for drinks was not an option and the satellite TV was terrible. It was about thirty shopping channels and three local channels (not queit that bad but almost). Luckuly I always travel with my netbook (to the bane of my wife) so I went to the local drug store and bought a $35 HDMI cable to connect my Dell 11z to the flat screen Tv in the condo. I also travel with movies and a few episodes of Burn Notice for those late Friday night flights home when I don't feel like doing anything. I happened to have State of Play with me so we watched that. Good movie.
Karen's brother drove up from Salt Lake City to join us and go skiing. Karen was still under the weather so Jerry and I skied for the day and Karen stayed at the Condo. Aloha Rental was very accomidating, they allowed us to transfer Karen's ski rental to Jerry so he did not have to pay for rentals.
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| From Park City 2009 |
We skied the back side of the mountain in the morning and the front in the afternoon. It was crazy-busy and I was almost run over by snowboarders several times. I am sure there are some snowboarders that pay attention but my experience is that they have their IPod on and are screaming down the mountain in their own little world not paying attention to other people. Case in point, Karen was back out in Park City in February for a work ski trip and a snowboarder literally ran her over, broke her thumb and sprained her shoulder. The girl was not watching where she was going.
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| From Park City 2009 |
Karen was feeling a little better by noon so we met her for lunch at one of the restaurants at the base of the mountain. I had lasagna for lunch and they gave me a huge piece. Good marketing for them because I had four people ask me where I got my lunch and I pointed them to the pasta line.
At then end of the day we drove back to Salt Lake City, Jerry to get back to his family and we had reservations at the Hilton Garden Inn in downtown Salt Lake City. I love Hilton Garden Inns, I have stayed at them many times before. This was Karen's first time at HGI and she liked it as much as I did. We liked the store they have in the lobby area and the rooma are large.
Karen's anitbiotics had kicked in but she was still not 100% so I picke dup dinner at the PF Changs several blocks away from the hotel. The restaurant does not have a parking lot so I parked illegaly to run in and get out food.
We spent Saturday with Jerry's family, it is always nice to see the neices and nephews. We got up Sunday, had breakfast and went to the airport.
Final opinions:
The Copper Bottom Inn looked a littel dated on the outside but the condos were updated and very nice. We did have problems with leaky (cold air) windows and a tub faucet that did not want to adjust.
Park City is nice but I prefer Alta or Snowbird.
As always, the Hilton Garden Inn is a great place to stay.
Cafe Terigo was excellent. The waitpeople were professional and the food was very good.
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