Park City, Utah—US Olympic Ski Center/Museum

 Day 26: Friday, June 18, 2021

We drive to Park City and explore the US Olympic Ski Center

I love the light play on the rock formations in this part of our country. The day was partly cloudy and as we ascended the Wasatch Mountains, the temperatures plummeted in the current heat wave—to the mid-80s! The vegetation in the area here is both green and dried out. We drove through aspen forests and evergreen forests where we could observe lots of die-off. Is it always thus? Hard to tell from a single visit. In any case, the colors are so different from our native NE Ohio, and I am really enjoying it. This country is spectacularly diverse; it makes one feel so small and insignificant. We have to do better in caring for the land we borrow for the time we’re here.

We really enjoyed our visit to the Olympic Ski Center in Park City today. (We were there in the morning; tomorrow we’re planning a “down day” and I’ll post the photos from Main Street, Park City then.) We were able to visit the Olympic Museum in Lausanne in 2005 and when we did a canoeing vacation in the Adirondacks, we took a day to visit Lake Placid as well. So, this was fun to add to our Olympic list. I hope you enjoy the pictures from today. (I wish I could’ve posted the ski jump video, but Blogger has some video requirements with Shutterfly that are prohibitive.)

There was a fun museum on the second floor with artifacts from the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Games. (Photos to follow)

There are ski jumps and the bobsled run as well as training pools for the  ski jumpers. They added a couple of zip lines for tourists like us and we decided to take advantage of the shorter one. Other activities included tubing down the (green) ski hills, alpine slide, and bobsled (this was really appealing until you think of those pros at the Olympics rolling over on a high side turn and such….this one was rated extremely challenging; our zip line was rated “easy”…😂).

Here we gooooo!

Way down at the bottom of the mountain, was the landing pad. Short, but fun ride. Apparently we could in theory get up to speeds of 40 mph, but it didn’t feel that fast. Now I can say that I’ve been on a zip line!

Olympic Winter Games bobsled run, as seen from the parking lot.

You could tube down these hills

2002 Winter Games pins display; these are fun

2002 Mascots

I never knew that athletes who represent their countries get participation medals, even if they don’t win a gold, silver or bronze. This display shows the participation medals from various Games.

Props used in the Opening Ceremonies

Ski wear display from the 1970s

The Alf Engen Ski Museum and the 2002 Winter Games Museum had  free admission and fun things to do—like this simulator for the downhill race!

No Winter Games display would be complete without an examination of the knitwear. This sweater, the Marius, was hand knit by Stein Eriksen’s mom and named after his brother, Marius, himself a Norwegian ski champion. Brother Stein was the ski director here at Park City after he retired from racing (he was an Olympic Gold medalist and World Champion in 1952 and 1954, respectively). What made me stop at this display was the sweater. Duh.

The cafe was closed, otherwise I could’ve slowly eaten a sandwich and watched these kids for hours. Note the jumper, head down, in the midst of his jump off the “single” ramp. The “skiers” are all wearing wetsuits and land in the water to break their falls. Totally entertaining.

Here’s a really young skier coming off the mogul ramp. 
When we arrived, I was watching several skiers coming down a big hill, covered with some kind of  “slidey” material (high density polypropylene? Something teflon coated?), who then landed on a hill that looked like a big “bouncy house”

While we were watching these jumps into the pool, my friend Sue from Seattle called with the news that PM Trudeau had extended the border closing between the US and Canada for one more month, to July 21. That will effectively prevent us from going to Banff, Calgary, Lake Louise/Moraine Lake, Jasper and Vancouver. Tomorrow we will plan alternate places to go and see in the Pacific NW and possibly Northern California. We’re both really disappointed, Dan moreso than me (I never quite believed that the border would actually be open in time for us to head up there!), but honestly, this could be really fun with less of a set schedule and a more spontaneous travel sense. 

Poor Dan. He’s stuck being my model….

Stay tuned for photos from downtown Park City…coming tomorrow!