Kelly and I decided it was time for a much-needed vacation, so we packed our bags and headed out to Park City, UT for some R&R. This is a log of our activities. It is more for my own sake so that when I’m old and senile, I can look back at what I did in my youth, but feel free to read on.

We woke up at 8:30am to start the day. The condo we’re staying at has a common clubhouse with wireless Internet access, so we took the laptop up there and plugged in for about 15 minutes. I was going on three whole days without checking my email, so I just had to get it out of my system.

We had originally planned on renting mountain bikes for the day and cruising around Park City, but we really wanted to do the ZipRider, so we headed over to Park City Mountain Resort.

PCMR is a great place to go in the summertime, especially if you have kids. They have bounce houses, horse rides, and a human maze, but the best things are the rides. The ZipRider is a ski lift that has been converted to allow you to strap yourself into a harness and ride down to the bottom of the hill. It was excellent. Afterward, I looked like the guy from the Maxell commercial, except my hair was blown straight up instead of back.

The second ride we went on was the Alpine Slide. You sit on this little sled with a stick in it. It’s kind of like luge, but you push forward on the stick to go faster and pull back to brake. It was great. It was like riding down a bobsled track. I led the whole way down, but Kelly caught up to me on the flat stretch. Damn you, gravity.

They were also installing an Alpine Coaster ride, which is exactly like it sounds – a roller coaster that starts at the top of the hill and winds it way down the slopes through the trees. It looked pretty crazy. The rails were narrow, the track was supported by thin aluminum tubing, and the corners all had safety nets installed. Not exactly confidence inspiring, but it would have been fun to try. Sadly for us, it won’t be open until sometime in August.

After a quick lunch at the bottom of the mountain, we headed back to the condo to recharge.

…

So the plan after lunch was to rent some mountain bikes and cruise the general area around our Condo. That didn’t happen. Both Kelly and I crashed out hard, and we didn’t end up leaving again until 3:45pm. So, we decided to just drive into town and walk a few trails.

We walked by the McPolin Farm, which was a pretty cool little historical site. The bunkhouse was tiny, but apparently back in the day they had three workers sleeping in there. The barn was massive, as were the adjacent concrete silos. We peeked into the dairy shed, and it looks like a local 4-H club now uses it for meetings. Kelly was very excited about this. After about a 3.5 mile hike, we decided to head back.

It was about 5pm. We had dinner reservations at 7:45pm, so we went to the clubhouse. Kelly sat by the pool, and I sat in the lobby, getting caught up on all that I had missed while being unplugged for 2+ days. It’s amazing how much you can miss in such a short amount of time. My Yahoo email account had close to 1,000 SPAM messages. Holy crap!

On to the dinner. We ate at a place called the PRIME Steakhouse. It’s one of those a la carte joints where you have to order everything separately, and the steak alone costs $30. Lucky for us, there isn’t a lot of traffic in Park City during the summer, so the steakhouse was running a 2-for-1 promotion. If we each ordered an entrée (didn’t have to be the same one, either), a drink, and a side, they would subtract the cost of the least expensive entrée from our bill. What a deal!

To start off, we got appetizers. Kelly got a bowl of Lobster and Crab Bisque soup, and I had a tomato & onion salad topped with bleu cheese. Outstanding. I’ve only ever had tomato & onion salad with vinegar and oil. The bleu cheese took it to a whole different level. Kelly’s soup was delicious, too.

For entrees, we both ordered the 8oz filet. Oh man, was it good. It was seasoned perfectly and cooked to specification, and they cooked it in such a way that the outside was a little crispy, while the inside was still tender and juicy. As a side, we ordered the garlic mashed potatoes, and we both agreed that without reservation, these were the best garlic mashed potatoes we’ve ever had.

The whole atmosphere was just very relaxing. The sun was setting, and the street and shop lights were starting to come alive. The steakhouse had a live guitar singer/performer playing music the whole time, and they were all covers of songs that Kelly and I both knew well. It’s hard to compare this with Mama’s Fish House, but in terms of overall experience, I would probably rate this as the best I have ever had.

After dinner, we strolled around the city for a bit, and then headed back to the condo to call it a night.