Singing on the Slopes of Park City

As we did last year, our roving retirement took us to Park City, Utah in order to continue our skiing adventure. Many things are different this year, but fortunately, we can still ski in the US with precautions. Last year we wrote two articles about our time in Utah “A Week of Park City Powder” and “Park City Sleep & Eats + Snowbasin“. Aside from not having any powder this year, these articles are still useful. We thought it would be interesting to compare skiing this year to skiing in other years.

Skiing During Covid

I can do it this year, yeah me! That’s a big change from last year. I skied for about 5 days over Christmas in Tahoe to get warmed up for Utah.  While it turns out that skiing really is like riding a bike, it isn’t quite like it used to be for me. So far, I haven’t spent more than about 2.5 hours on the slopes on any ski day. My leg is fine, but I’m having back issues again. It turns out that if I sing, I ski better, so now I’m working on the right playlist. In fact, at one point Mike was behind me yelling “Sing!”

The other thing that has changed about skiing is that you need a reservation for most days you want to ski. Advanced planning is required or you may not be allowed on the mountain, even with a pass. Saturdays and holidays do fill up. Even then, the worst lift line was about 15 minutes. Also, masks were required in lift lines and that was usually enforced. Fortunately, I had found some neck gator type masks that worked really well.

Finally, since we have decided to “winter” in the Rockies this year and we have Epic (season) passes, we don’t feel guilty about only staying out for a few hours. A few hours is better because there isn’t much snow this year, anywhere. Staying on groomed runs loses its appeal after a while.

Lodging During Covid

We stayed at our own ski-in/ski-out timeshare again and got a great room right on the same floor as the ski check, gym, and apres-ski drinks. We also had our own balcony but it was just too cold outside to use.

The resort set up limits and appointments for everything. You needed a reservation for a hot tub, which we had to ourselves, but also with a 30-minute limit. You had to pick up a key for the gym because it was limited to 6 people at a time. Finally, you had to walk through a Disney-esque line for the ski check. At least at happy hour, you could come by and pick up your drink and take it outside or back to your room.

Dining During Covid

On the mountain, you often needed a reservation to get into a lodge where you could get warm and pay $15.95 for a burger. This year’s selection of food was very limited. We only ate on the mountain twice this year. Once with a reservation and once without because they weren’t too busy mid-week. The tables were very socially distanced.

In town, all of the usual restaurants were serving dinner with reservations-only. We only went out to eat twice and felt very safe both times. I have to mention our dinner at Fireside. We went there many years ago when you took yourself to all of their fires to build your four-course meal, now they serve you but the atmosphere and the food are memorable.

Snow Basin

After missing out last year, I was looking forward to skiing Snow Basin. The mountains around Ogden are really beautiful and you do get an up-close view of them at Snow Basin. From the top of the Strawberry Gondola, you can see the Great Salt Lake. It was truly majestic and the main run down was over an icy cornice and down a very steep bowl. But the views and the snow were worth it. We both agreed that it would be awesome after a few more storms. There is so much accessible terrain.

If you were to ski this year where, would you go?