Utah Trip Day Three: Sunday, July 3, 2011: Baby You're a Firework!

Boy, it has been a long time since we have been mountain biking! Two years? At least. We were quickly reminded how taxing and difficult the sport is and how the mountain is ultimately in control, not you. Thankfully, no one was seriously injured, just a few scrapes and bruises here and there, so that was" good news. Overall we had a really great time. We got a little muddy and were definitely tired by the end of it. :)

After biking we rested for a while before attending a free, outdoor concert being held on The Canyons property. We staked out a nice spot on a hill amongst the hundreds of people and enjoyed the R&B band crank out some fun tunes. While we were there I spotted this adorable baby girl wearing a loud red, white, and blue tu-tu. She looked like a little firework! Can you say Katy Perry?

Following the concert, was a firework display put on by the resort. We moved spots and were fortunate to find a wonderful grassy area for us to lie down on. They were shooting them off in a parking lot just below us so we had one of the best seats in the house. They truly did an amazing job. My mom described them as "The best fireworks she had ever seen," (outside of Disney World of course). They really were quite incredible. So this was our second night of fireworks in a row and we new we were going to see more the next night! It was a fantastic way to end the night and gear up for the Fourth the following day!

Utah Trip Day 2: Saturday, July 2, 2011

I realized that in my last post, I forgot to mention which part of Utah that we visit with our time share. Every other year we come to Park City - about 40 minutes East of Salt Lake City. The Utah Olympic Park and training facilities are located here and some of the events from the 2002 Salt Lake Winter Olympic games were held at this site, too. The terrain here is beautiful and our time share property sits at the base of one of the valley's many ski resorts (ours is The Canyons).

Today we kind of took it easy. We took our time in the morning with breakfast and the such and then headed up to the Olympic Park for a freestyle ski jumping show at one o'clock. You're probably thinking, "It's summer, how in the world are you going to watch ski jumping??" Hang on, though, because I am about to blow your mind. At this facility, they have special ski jumps that are coated with plastic hairs - like grass - and when wet, have very little traction and makes it ideal for skiing. But that only addresses half of the actual issue of summer jumping. Sure you could ski down, go off the jump and fly in the air, but what about the landing? There is not enough snow to make a runway! But check this out, they actually have a massive swimming pool for the jumpers to land in! At the bottom of the pool are pipes that, when cued, release tons of bubbles before the skier lands in the water. The purpose of this is to break the surface tension so that the athletes sink a little instead of hitting the hard surface of the water flat out (like a belly flop but from 50 feet in the air). The summer ski jumpers' attire included life vests and swim trunks/pants and a helmet. Not your typical skier, huh? They even had skis with large slits cut into them to make swimming with them on a little easier. Phew! Man, I am getting tired just thinking about it! But this arial show was truly spectacular! Hopefully I will put some videos of the show up on my Facebook or YouTube page some time next week.

After the ski jumping show, we rode the Xtreme Zipline - one of the many fun activities open to the public at the Park (for a price of course...). The zip line is supposedly the World's Steepest Zipline, running along side the K 120 ski jump hill and reaching up to 50 miles per hour! Needless to say, it was pretty fun :). Also at the park you can ride the bobsled on the actual Olympic track, ride an Alpine slide, or even learn to ski jump for real.

Afterwards, we hit up World Market for lunch and indulged ourselves in the most amazing free samples ever! You think Costco is good? This was ten times better. Samles included divine cheesecake, jalepeño jelly, goat cheese, etc. Can you say delicious?

We got back around four and were fortunate to find that our room accomedations had been fixed and we could move over then. Of course this made us happy, although Morgan was a little disappointed because they had told us if they could not get the issue resolved, they would place us in the Presidential Suite. We joked that we were going to rub it in that kid-from-the-elevator's face if it really happened, but alas, it did not. But now we have our spacious condo again and we love it.

Later that evening, we drove to Oakley, Utah for professional rodeo. Morgan was ecstatic for she LOVES horses. I, on the other hand, have never gotten into that scene due to my allergy to horses and hay, and because of that, I was a little bit afraid of attending. But we went anyways and it turned out to be pretty fun. In my opinion, the barrel racing and rodeo clowns were the best parts. I enjoyed the other events, but I always felt that it was unfair to the animals and I felt bad for them. Nonetheless, we all had a blast and all I did was sneeze a couple of times. At the end, there was a fantastic firework display and a great spirit amongst everyone in the crowd. :)

Utah Trip: Day One: Friday, July 1, 2011 - From Colorado to Utah

The first time we vacationed in Utah, my sister, Morgan, and I were both little chicitas at the ages of 10 and 12 respectively. Now we're back for the third time (14 and 16) and looking forward to all the great things coming up in the next week that we get to share with our parents. This is my first ever road trip as a licensed driver which makes my parents fairly happy; I won't deny that I am kind of excited myself. We left about one o'clock this afternoon and I took the first driving shift from Longmont to Rawlins, Wyoming.

Wyoming is an interesting place to drive through. If you keep your eyes pealed, you can find some pretty strange things. For instance, we saw an actual camel on someone's property next to the interstate! Also, a legitament town with a population of 1 (Buford, WY). Granted these are not the most exciting sight (on one trip we found a cave with a random garden gnome in it....but that's a different story.....), but this region of the country sure has some breath-taking beauty. The sky is a different place out here. I personally feel like the sky is more blue and the clouds bloom bigger and fluffier. There are also sporaticlly, fascinating plateaus and rock formations along side the road. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get a good picture of these geographical figures due to the fact that we were driving and the features were somewhat distant. But when I look at them with their flat tops or irregular formations, I am amazed by how God chose to shape this landscape; and at the same time I have to wonder how much of this He shaped with The Flood. I wonder about stuff like that all the time.

However, one thing that really annoys me about Wyoming is the wind. What should be an easy cruise on an almost empty interstate becomes a white-knuckle drive as you fight to stay in your lane. Maybe other, more experienced drivers find it to be no big deal, but I certainly didn't appreciate the invisible force literally pushing me around despite me being the one with the several hundred pound vehicle complete with mountain bikes.

Furthermore, at some point along our trip, we stopped at a Little America. For those of you who do not know what a Little America is, it is a really nice rest stop along the interstate with a gas station, restaurant, park, sitting areas, etc. They are just the nicest places to take a break at during a road trip. But anyways, while we were there we decided to have dinner. Now keep in mind, when my family travels, we can get pretty loopy and silly in a good way. Fortunately, we had this awesome waiter named Yusuf who had a fun accent and played along with our crazy antics (most of which attracted stares from the other people in the restaurant).

Morgan drinking out of 3 straws.

When we arrived that evening (about 9:30pm), the Westgate property was like another home for us. Lots of memories had been had here in the past and we were looking forward to creating some new ones too. Unfortunately, there was a mix up in our room assignment which placed us in a much smaller room than we paid for and the size of room we did pay for was booked. But the staff assured us they would do everything they could to get things sorted out. However, the best part of the night was riding the elevator with this kid who seemed to be about 11 years old who was playing hide-and-seek or something with his friend.
"Do you mind if I stand there [the corner of the elevator]? I'm hiding from my friend and if he sees me, I'll die."
"Well if it's a matter of life and death..."
To me, that was hilarious. Once we were inside he decided to tell us that he had been coming here for seven years and that "They'll [the company] try and get you to buy the Presidential Suite. But don't do it! You could buy a house for the price of what it costs! So watch out, they'll try and get ya!" Then the doors opened and he ran away. Keep in mind, this was only like a thirty second elevator ride. Strange, little encounter, but so funny! But now, thanks to that little boy, we now know not to go for the Presidential Suite!

That is probably enough on today - nothing too exciting, but fun nonetheless. :)