Small Town Charm in a World-Class Resort

By Toni Davis

Park City, Utah, has finally been discovered as a true four-season world-class destination. In just the five years that I’ve lived here, its charm as a ski, live music, film festival, golf, fishing, biking, and hiking Mecca has dramatically increased. Especially since a good portion of the Winter Olympics were staged right here in our little town in February of 2002 when the whole world sat up and took notice.

Meandering down historic Main Street filled with scores of shops, restaurants, art galleries and hotels, one can almost feel what it must have been like during Park City’s silver mining heyday. With over 120 buildings in Park City on the National Register of Historic Places, one can’t help but be drawn in to its mystique. My first visit was magical and within a few months, I had made the move to Park City in the middle of winter.

When summer arrived, I was pleasantly surprised to find that the mountains and trees were a beautiful lush emerald green and the skies were the bluest skies I’d ever seen. The spectacular hiking trails throughout Park City are teeming with abundant wildflowers, soaring birds, other wildlife, rushing streams and breathtaking scenery that allow you to explore Mother Nature at your own pace.

Changing Seasons
Almost every activity year-round is geared to the outdoors and rightfully so. In the summer, the temperatures typically range from the high 70s and low 80s to nighttime lows in the 40s and 50s. It’s warm, sunny and dry, with cool, clear nights. In the winter, unless it’s snowing, the blue skies are contrasted against the snow-capped mountaintops with temperatures staying cold and crisp. But in the winter in Park City, there is no more magnificent sight than the falling snow. It’s dry, fluffy and light earning the moniker “The Greatest Snow on Earth.”

Park City is most commonly known for its three world-class ski resorts, all within six miles of each other—The Canyons, Park City Mountain Resort and Deer Valley. However, in the summer, each resort also comes alive offering such things as mountain horse back riding through rugged terrain, lift-served mountain biking and hiking, the Alpine Slide, free outdoor concerts, and farmer’s markets where you can buy the freshest organic produce and exquisite crafts from local artisans.

During the summers in Park City, nearly 100 outdoor live music events happen all over town compliments of Mountain Town Stages, a non-profit organization dedicated to making Park City a mountain musical Shangri-la. The Forum at The Canyons is the site for national acts such as Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, Dave Mason, and Shana Morrison (Van’s daughter)—again, all free. It is a family affair, summer and winter, where you are allowed to bring your own food and beverages to enjoy the show. And let’s not forget the Park City Jazz Festival, which takes place outdoors at Deer Valley Resort in August with three days of non-stop music from internationally recognized musicians.

Also an annual event, the Sundance Film Festival, takes place for ten days in the latter half of January. It is a spectacle to behold, when thousands and thousands of film enthusiasts flock to Park City to get a peek at the best of the best independent films. Scores of aspiring actors, producers, and directors come together with some of the biggest names in Hollywood to make cinematic history.

Olympic Venue
A visit to the Utah Olympic Park is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Fourteen Olympic medal events took place in February 2002, including bobsled, luge, skeleton and ski jumping. With the highest altitude jumps in the world at 7,310 feet and the fastest bobsled, skeleton and luge track in the world, the 400-acre Utah Olympic Park is a year-round experience not to be missed. Unbeknownst to most people, the Park offers visitors a chance to experience first-hand the thrill of racing down the bobsled track at over 70 mph with a professional driver.

In the summer on Saturdays, visitors can watch freestyle athletes launch into the air over 50 feet while performing a series of twists and flips, landing into a 750,000 gallon “bubbling” pool. The Utah Olympic Park is used year-round for many national and international competitions involving athletes from around the globe.

Park City now offers RVers a full service RV park open year-round. Located within minutes from Park City, Park City RV Resort has been completely renovated by locals and new owners, Doug and Jane Sorensen, who are also active RVers. Wanting to attract RVers to this world-class destination, Park City RV Resort has 75 sites, with more than half offering full hookups. Big-rig friendly with 75-foot pull-throughs, the park has other amenities, including wireless Internet to all sites, a fitness room, laundry facilities, a rock-climbing wall, a small store for essentials, and a clubhouse offering big screen TV, a pool table, a fireplace, video games and free high-speed Internet access. There are also five state parks and four exceptional public golf courses located within minutes of Park City that rival those anywhere.

Dining Choices
Whether you visit with or without your RV, Park City offers everything from casual dining to the finest of cuisines at over 100 restaurants in this town of 10,000 people. The choices are endless. Our absolute favorite is Chimayo’s on Historic Main Street where we order their signature London Broil of Elk that comes with impeccable service. We also enjoy eating at El Chubasco, an inexpensive locals’ favorite with a fresh salsa bar and the best Mexican food in the State of Utah.

Built in 1903, what now stands as the “No Name Saloon” contains an abundance of Park City history with antiques, signs, eclectic paintings, pictures of the local Rugby team, and a Harley Davidson motorcycle hanging from the ceiling. The vision of owners Mike Johnson and Jesse Shetler has made the No Name into a Park City icon where anything and everything can and has happened.

One snowy winter evening after skiing, I ventured in to play shuffleboard, a popular No Name activity. After the game, I exchanged business cards with my worthy opponent, George, to find I had been playing shuffleboard with George Randolph Hearst III, whose great-great-grandfather George Hearst and partners were responsible for the production of over $50 million of silver from the Park City Ontario Mine in the late 1800s.

Overall, Park City is recognized as one of the most convenient and accessible destinations in the country, summer or winter. It offers visitors, young and old alike, a wonderland of outdoor recreation activities, dining experiences, unique shops, historic tours, music concerts and international cultural events to suit everyone’s tastes.