This place is absolutely beautiful in the winter. This last week about every day I made a cross country/back country hike of some sort up into these mountains above Pinebrook.
Orientation: The picture above is from the mountains above Pinebrook looking southeast. Notice the solid white rectangle (or trapezoid) looking feature just above and a little to the right of the center. That is the Utah Olympic Park - the ski jumps are just to the left. The ski runs visible on the mountains behind and high above and to the right of Olympic Park are from the Canyons ski area (now owned by Park City Resort). Behind and to the left of these Canyons runs (and which in the picture appear to be directly behind Olympic Park) are ski runs from the Park City resort and behind those, way at the horizon of the picture, is the Deer Valley resort.
As I am taking this picture and enjoying nature and the spectacular view, I am missing what is going on in the small mountain town sitting at the top of valley at the base of Park City ski hills:
Yes, this is Sundance Film Festival time (January 21- 31, 2016) - the time for celebrities and "wanna be" celebrities, other important people who hangout with celebrities and those who just want to look at them, along with a few folks interested in independent movies, to all come together and schmooze in Park City.
One minor controversy this year was that Uber offered helicopter flights (UberChopper) from Salt Lake up to Park City - $300 one way.
Seriously, it is a 30-45 minute drive from SLC to Park City and, in any event, the helicopter doesn't actually land in Park City, but in a field off Old Ranch Road about a 15 minute drive in traffic from the key venues on Main Street. This is a service for those where how you arrive at the party is as important as the party (which probably describes a lot of those at Sundance).
The local authorities claimed Uber did not have the proper zoning approvals and the Summit County sheriff issued a cease and desist order. But Uber, being Uber, flew the copters anyway. However, after a few days Uber decided to halt the flights, even though a court declined to enforce the cease and desist order (lack of evidence). For their part, the local authorities claimed the flights were disturbing to local residents (including foxes, an elk herd, an occasional moose and people who had moved out there for peace and quiet). For its part, Uber said that the snowy weather predicted for the coming week would not allow the flights. So, in the end some festival goers had no choice but to endure the 30-45 minute limo rides and Uber learned that in Park City, even at the Sundance Film Festival, you should not mess with the foxes, the moose and their friends.
All the locals I spoke with were clear that this was a good time to avoid Park City, which I suppose is one of the reasons I was skiing around these hills. Here are some more pictures:
This lift chair memorial is something of a landmark and, since I really don't know the names of these mountains, it is a useful reference point. This is about as high as I usually go up these hills and most of the pictures were taken from the summit of this ridge.
Breaking the trail as the first one up since the last snow: Ahead
and behind:
Evie and I, however, did not entirely avoid Park City and the Sundance Film Festival.
First, we drove through the festival traffic in Park City and went skiing on the "rail" trail, which runs from near downtown Park City east to Highway 40 (and beyond). It was fun. It is one of many trails that the city and county groom in the winter. As it follows the old railroad (that hauled silver ore out of the Park City mines to the UP main line), it was almost level with a slight downhill grade to the east (which was convenient since that was the direction we were headed). Park City is behind Evie and she's looking down the canyon towards Highway 40. Although not visible in this picture, Silver Creek runs along the side of the trail, with beaver dams, etc.
And second, Evie and I went to one of the film festival venues - the Redstone Theaters - Monday evening. However, lacking a helicopter, limo, or special festival shuttle and without an entourage we arrived in a red Subaru Outback. About half of the theaters were reserved for festival films and the others for regular movie fare. There were special roped off lines for those with tickets for the festival films and professionally nice young women with headsets politely, but very firmly, herded folks out of the way of important people who were about to enter or exit the theaters. We saw Star Wars for the second time (which seemed even better than the first). The festival notwithstanding, I suspect it was still one of the better films playing that week in Park City, although the crowd in our theater, like us, seemed exceptionally ordinary.
