Park City
Thursday 20 January 2005

Weather

Story of the Day

Sue and I decided to stop off for a few days in Salt Lake City on our way to San Francisco for The Open Group's January 2005 conference. At one stage, Sue was planning to do a little bit of skiing but decided against it on the grounds that she was not fit enough. We flew out to Salt Lake on Wednesday, after I had done my 2 days of lecturing at Reading University. We landed in the late evening and stayed at the Fairfield Inn near the airport .. cheap and effective, with free wireless internet access in the room.

On Thursday morning, we stopped at Breeze ski rental in Salt Lake and then headed for Park City. Salt Lake City was in the middle of a temperature inversion that resulted in murky smog and cold temperatures down in the valley. As soon as we started to climb up I-80 out of the valley, we were in the clear.

We arrived at Park City at around 9:30am. The car park was almost empty, and we parked right alongside the slopes near First Time lift. There was clearly plenty of snow, with huge banks at the sides of the car park. The weather showed off Park City to its best, with blue skies and sun. Even at 9:30 it was beginning to get warm.

The race hill from the parking lot	Sue in the parking lot

First Time (270) : Silver Hollow

I already had a lift pass, so I left Sue at the car and used First Time to get up the mountain. The old slow lift has been replaced by an express detachable quad. This makes a tremendous difference, particularly before ski school groups start falling off at the top!

First Time run under First Time lift	The race hill from First Time lift

I was recovering from a cracked rib sustained in Vail, so I started off very tentatively to see whether skiing was actually sensible. Taking Pay Day and Bonanza to the summit, I then skied down Prospector face to the bottom of King Con and then did two easy cruises from King Con.

From Temptation, I tried the conditions among the bushes to the left of the run and rapidly returned to the groomed slope. Skiing conditions were not as perfect as the weather!

It had been warm the previous day, so the snow softened up and then froze hard over night. With the mid-winter sun low in the sky it would take several hours for the snow to soften. In addition, there was a significant difference between the runs groomed on the "first shift" and those that were not groomed until later. The "first shift" runs had frozen groomed, so were nice and smooth. The "second shift" runs had frozen first, so the grooming machine had reduced them to ice balls.

Bonanza lift	Broadway from King Con lift
The base area from King Con ridge	Deer Valley from King Con Ridge
Park City from King Con Ridge

After 2 easy runs, I ventured onto Monitor. This looked as if it had been groomed 24 hours earlier. It was horrible. Even though it was not very rough, it was frozen solid, so it was back to the groomed stuff.

Back at the Summit, I decided to head down to Pioneer lift with slopes facing the sun. Belmont, a relatively short mogul run on the route down towards Mid Mountain confirmed that the slopes in the sun were beginning to soften. I was actually aiming for Mid Mountain, but came out below it, so had to take one run from Pioneer to get up to it for a comfort stop. This proved to be an excellent run. Comstock had softened up nicely and was easy to ski.
 

The top of Bonanza lift and Summit House from Pioneer lift	The Mardi Gras tree

The detailed notes prepared at the time run out at this point. As I have skied Park City more than 50 times, trying to remember a specific visit more than two years later is not easy. From the run record and the photographs it is obvious that I moved on to several runs from McConkey's, starting off with one run in each direction around the rim of the bowl and finishing with a run at least partially into the bowl itself.

McConkey's Lift	McConkey's Lift
Looking down from the ridge above McConkey's bowl	McConkeys Lift from the middle of McConkey's Bowl
Woodside

Leaving McConkey's Bowl, apart from the almost flat cat-track, the only way out is via Pioneer lift and the Summit. I added a little bit of challenge to the run down to the base area to meet Sue for lunch by taking Crescent and Waterfall.

Trees alongside Pioneer lift	The Mardi Gras Tree
Pioneer Lift	Blueslip Bowl
The top of McConkey's Lift	Jupiter Peak
Ice bar on the Legacy Lodge Terrace	Garnish dispensers

After lunch I took 4 runs before my legs gave out, the most challenging being the moguls on Mens SL.

The top of Payday	Sunrise run from the top of Bonanza
The top of Home Run	Distant view of McConkey's Bowl
Ski patrol dog

Runs

Last updated: 7th February 2007