The Alf Engen Ski Museum (free admission) is dedicated to the history of skiing in Utah and the 2002 Winter Olympics. The story goes something like this: The Army came to look after the Mormons, and their officer sent the bored men into the mountains to search for silver and gold. They found some, and Park City became a gold rush town. When the gold petered out, Park City became a ghost town. Norwegians that came to this area for the gold rush excitement brought their skis with them and introduced skiing to the area. An avid skiing businessman from Salt Lake thought it would be a good idea to start a ski slope as a commercial enterprise, and used mining equipment to build the first ski lift. Park City began to make money with snow. One hundred years later, the Winter Olympics were here, and this area is currently booming and busy.

After touring the museum, we were able to hop on a tour bus with an expert in downhill events like bobsled and luge. Mr. Roepke has done these events, helped prepare the slope by hand for these events, announced these events, and has two children in competition (16 year-old Augie on development team). He is very knowledgeable and passionate about it. He described walking down the luge/bobsled/skeleton track with ice cleats on your heels to “paint” ice on it with hoses and shave and shape the ice by hand while being in a “tunnel” because they cover the track to prevent sun melting and damage.

We were able to meet two-time Olympian, four-time World Championship Ben Loomis who competes in the Nordic Combined event where they ski jump and cross-country ski. He first jumped at age five, and took the tall hill at age 13. He is currently number one in the US! He was here with his coach doing summer jumping on this ski jump that is sprayed with water to give it a snow-feel. The “real” athletes come here now that the summer tourist events are finished and the park is quiet for a bit. Oh, darn, we won’t be able to do the crazy tubing or zip lining now.

We drove through the historic downtown area of Park City, and it is very pretty, but parking for a big van is hard to come by. We drove back to our campground to the Heber Valley Milk and Artisan Cheese business for a lunch of soup and grilled cheese sandwiches; lots of samples were out to try. Oh, and I had some delicious caramel ice-cream that rightfully looked to be the most popular kind there with its almost empty tub. So good! Bought lunch then cheese to go.