Above Park City ..... and Into the Fog. - part 1

This is a 2-part series, because I really have TOO MANY pictures and didn't want to delete any! Now I really wanted to create a slideshow set to music, but all my research and Alicia's help could not figure out how to create a high picture quality result that I could easily share.  And with virtually any music added, YouTube will take the results down due to copyright infringement on the music

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Above Park City

It was a cold and windy night..

Well actually it was mostly raining and/or threatening to rain. A day in the outdoors did not look like it was in the cards, so we decided to take a drive. Up Rt 224 throughout Park City ski resort, yes this road actually drives through the ski area. Imagine driving a car up a well-paved road, under chair lifts, to the top of the mountain. Along the way, we were astonished to find some rather large lodges well up on the mountain....Montage  this one was very close to the top, at around 8000 ft. They have to keep the road open in the winter ... a crazy prospect for sure.

We did the drive without any expectations: didn't know where we would end up, what we would see, if it would rain on us, if the roads were crappy dirt/muddy or worse (a road that could puncture yet another tire!)

What  happened is that after driving through the ski resort, we ended up at the top, at the crest line of the range. It was an open view for almost 360 degrees and spotted with various chair lifts. Definitely the top.  We were up near the Jupiter and Empire bowls (open google maps for Park City and follow 224 through the ski areas.)

It wasn't raining, but we were in unsettled weather.

The altitude, shifting weather pattern and expansive surroundings, set up some nice condition for camera shots.

The view east looking over the Park City basin (this is the ski area). The summit chairs were to the left.

Looking West from where we stopped at the summit.

Panning the west looking area  - we pulled out the binoculars and spotted snow capped peaks on the horizon -- no idea what range it was.

More on the west side

 A panorama

A bit more along the crest line road.

Just kept stopping and shooting.

As noted in the intro -- more shooting and less deleting -- even though some shots look the same.

Dropping into Big Cottonwood Canyon on the way to Brighton ski area

The view down into Brighton ski area -- a small area that is full of snowboarders in the winter.

 The road into Big Cottonwood -- Alta and Snowbird are somewhere over the ridge line.  We could have taken this road all the way to Salt Lake City ... that sure would have been "taking the back road!"