Park City Connected, March 28, 2016

Tony Crocker

Administrator
Staff member
Liz wanted to spend Monday in Park City investigating ski boots and rest in anticipation of the likely next two powder days. I decided to go with her and check out the merged terrain of Park City and Canyons. I expected a mostly groomer day with likely refrozen conditions. However it snowed all day and much terrain was nicely resurfaced by the afternoon.

Liz dropped me off by Park City’s Eagle chair at 10AM. From there I skied the not surprisingly firm Liberty to King Con, then ascended to higher elevations for most of the day. I skied one run on Prospector before taking the new Quicksilver gondola into the Canyons side. I had not skied much of the far southern sector of Canyons before so I spent most of the day crossing to Red Pine for lunch and back.

I skied Blaise’s and Golden Spruce to the Dreamcatcher chair, 1,500 vertical which I would ski on the way back. But for now I skied the easy Bliss trail near Dreamscape.
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Not a person or track in sight at 11AM, too bad that new snow is only a couple of inches deep now. Another possible reason for the solitude in this sector is that all 3 chairs in it are slow speed.

The next chair is the 800 vertical Daybreak chair, which I would describe as a “real estate lift,” as it’s quite flat, crosses several roads and has houses almost to its 9,200 foot summit. On the map the Peak 5 lift looks close, but the canyon between them is too deep so you ski all the way down to Tombstone. By this time I had probably skied at least 10 bridges/tunnels through the immense Colony real estate development at the Canyons. That wouldn’t be where I would choose to to have a ski house, but those who built there must be delighted that they are now situated not far off center of the 7,300 acres now combined by Vail Resorts.

I next rode 9,990 and skied Charlie Brown on its north side which I knew would have winter snow similar to the Cottonwoods.
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Note this is also very quiet around noon. Due to topography it takes two lifts and a very long runout to lap this terrain, so no surprise it preserves very well. I skied to Red Pine for lunch, then took a lap through the Pines on the north side of Saddleback before heading back towards Park City. On the way I took a lap on 9,990 linking partial north faces near its liftline.

Then I skied two runs on 1,000 vertical Peak 5, where I had never been before. First run through the Abyss trees I sluffed some snow and exposed a rock band, fortunately stopping above and then picking my way around it. Below the rocks was all untracked and very nice as it was north facing and about 9,000 feet. I skied the mellower Mystic Pines before departing Peak 5 on Harmony.
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In this direction you can ski to Dreamscape directly. There was a short break in the weather so I took this picture of the vacation homes along the Daybreak lift.
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Let’s hope Vail gets around to putting lifts up to the ridge above the homes. Moving south along that ridge would eventually connect to the Jupiter/Pinecone Ridge sectors of Park City.

I skied Chimera and some trees near the Dreamcatcher lift, then the long Cascade runout to Iron Mountain. I took a lap on Double Nickel there before returning to Park City on the Quicksilver gondola at 3PM.

So far my day had gone according to plan and I intended to quit soon and save my energy for Tuesday/Wednesday. But I had only skied McConkey’s once and decided to check it out as I could get there via one ride on Silverlode. There was quite a bit of powder by now so that excursion was worthwhile. The runout led to Bonanza, and since the lift was high speed and I didn’t want to walk up a short hill to ski directly to the base I boarded it.

By now the snow had resumed along with poor visibility. Thus exiting Bonanza I was lured by low angle untracked into Claimjumper, which led back to Silverlode. Silverlode stopped as I arrived, and as Bonanza had been windy I did not relish the thought of being stick on a windhold lift. I skied down to the more sheltered King Con. Skiing down King Con Ridge, skier’s right was continuously roped off. I should have ducked the rope and skied down the race course to the Park City base. Staying on the ridge led me down Vista to the Silver Star real estate development. I called Liz to come get me there, but that took a while and I was quite soaked from waiting in the sleet down there at 7,000 feet.

I skied 7,800 vertical at Park City and 17,800 at the Canyons, with about 5K of powder.
 
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