Biking is Great Way to Tour San Francisco’s Must-See Attractions

A view of the Golden Gate Bridge shrouded in San Francisco’s famous fog, from Vista Point on the bike trail © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

By Karen Rubin,

Travel Features Syndicate, goingplacesfarandnear.com

The weather is overcast on the day I have set to do that iconic bike ride along San Francisco’s waterfront, over the Golden Gate Bridge into Sausalito and on to Tiburon. But that doesn’t stop me or several thousand other visitors to this engaging city. I just throw in some rain gear along with water and snacks.

I set out for Blazing Saddles, which has the largest bike fleet in California and some nine locations throughout San Francisco.

The company’s main location is at 2715 Hyde Street, ideally located in Fisherman’s Wharf, and just a block and a half from the start of the National Park Bike Path. This path takes riders on a beautiful, car-free bike ride along the bay, passed the Marina, through historic Fort Mason, and over to the Golden Gate Bridge, which is where most of the riders go.

Blazing Saddles has been in business over 30 years – it is the original “Bike the Bridge” company – but now has some new offerings, including a new electric bike model that was custom-made for the company, the Electric Blazer, and a free mobile app.

The new “e-Blazer” was customized for Blazing Saddles and they say is the lightest electric bike. The bike looks like regular bike (the battery is on the luggage rack on the back rather than where your legs are). It would be exceptional if you were riding San Francisco’s hills.

But a consideration for me, as the Blazing Saddles person explains, is that e-bikes, can only take the Blue & Gold ferry line from Sausalito or Tiburon to Pier 41, which has somewhat more limited service than the Golden Gate Ferry (which goes into the Ferry Building at Embarcadero  – so I see that my last time back from Tiburon (where I am trying to get to) would be 4:15 pm and it is already noon.

San Francisco skyline, from the ramp up to the Golden Gate Bridge © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

I decide not to take the e-bike but to take a regular bike, which is lighter and easier for me to get on/off, and soldier through the hills, starting with Fort Mason (made it!), then the ramp up to Golden Gate Bridge (made it!).

The weather may be overcast, but I get to see that wonderful scene of the Golden Gate Bridge half-shrouded in San Francisco’s famous fog, a scene that changes moment to moment, it seems.

It is 8 miles to Sausalito – that takes about 1 ½ hours (you won’t just be riding over the Golden Gate Bridge, you will want to sightsee, stop for photos, and also have to keep stopping for pedestrians). Plan to spend time – at least an hour – in Sausalito which has really wonderful shops, galleries, eateries and scenic views, even if you are planning to continue the ride to Tiburon. (I have spent time in Sausalito a few days before on my way back from Muir Woods with Extranomical Tours.)

Plan on spending time in Sausalito, which offers delightful galleries, shops and eateries © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

It is 10 more miles between Sausalito and Tiburon, which should take another 1 ½ to 2 hrs.

Blazing Saddles does an excellent job of preparing  you – showing a 2-minute video of the route along the waterfront through the Marina district, up over Fort Mason (a strenuous hill) to the ramp up to Golden Gate Bridge (also strenuous hill), then down, down, down, into Sausalito.

They also give you a ticket for the ferry which you don’t actually pay for unless you use it (saves time and anxiety to buy the ticket at the ferry but I notice that the Blue & Gold lets you buy the ticket on the ferry, also). When I get back, I pay Blazing Saddles $11.50 for the ferry (the same amount as you would pay directly to the ferry). Their map/brochure even gives the time schedule for the ferries.

They tell us we should return the bikes by 7:30 pm or else call. They supply quality helmets, a lock, a pouch and luggage rack, and an excellent map (which also shows points of interest along the routes) and take care to properly fit the bike. (Blazing Saddles offers an all-day guided tour out of the 2715 Hyde Street location, departing 10 am and 1 pm, that includes the all-day Deluxe Comfort bike rental for $55/adult, $35/child).

Enroute to Tiburon I stumble upon the Audubon Sanctuary © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

I had really wanted to see the ride to Tiburon which is mostly on a bike trail but partly sharing the road. But once you get under the highway and go along the highway on the service road, the sign to the bike route (for Bike Route 8) to Tiburon is confusing (everyone else I met on the line to the ferry made the same mistake) – when actually, all you have to do is follow the service road maybe ¼ mile more and turn up on Belvedere Road, for a much more pleasant ride (just a few hills) which soon connects to a very nice bike trail (Bike Route 10).

I made the mistake of not biking out to Mill Valley’s Old Mill Park, where you get to see the Coastal Redwoods, and then connecting to the Bike Route #8 – which is the way Blazing Saddles recommends to go (I was in a hurry to get to Tiburon).

The weather does not cooperate, but fortunately I have prepared for rain.

Eventually you connect with Route 10 which is a dedicated bike trail along the water into Tiburon.

Tiburon’s main street © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Even with getting lost (involving riding up three major hills in the residential area and stumbling upon the beautiful Audubon sanctuary (until a very nice man stopped his car and pointed out the route to me), I still get to Tiburon at 3:55 pm. There is not nearly as much to visit as in Sausalito, so I basically walked up and down the street in the “historic” district where the shops are and still made it to the 4:15 pm ferry for the fun 35-minute scenic “cruise” back to San Francisco’s Pier 41 at Fisherman’s Wharf, stopping at Angel Island and passing very close to Alcatraz on the way. There were a gazillion other bikes – a huge slew with the Blazing Saddles emblem – and the ferry people are extremely efficient in loading and unloading the bikers.

A slew of bikes on the Blue & Gold Ferry from Tiburon to Pier 41 © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Besides this most popular Bike the Bridge ride (average 3 hours for the full 22 miles into Tiburon), other recommended routes include Bike the Parks (San Francisco’s bike route system connects Union Square and the “Wiggle” to the famous Golden Gate Park and the Presidio, 15 miles averaging 2-3 hours; the Marin Headlands Loop (from the north side of the Bridge, follow the coast west on Conzelman Road, out towards Point Bonita and Rodeo Beach, 10 miles, 2-3 hours; and “Conquer Mount Tamalpais, which would take you to Muir Woods National Monument, 15 miles beyond Sausalito, for a 5-6 hour trip – the elevations to Mount Tamalpais at 2,574 feet, make this especially challenging.

Rain doesn’t dampen the enthusiasm for biking through Fisherman’s Wharf © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Indeed, San Francisco, despite its hills, is one of the most bike-friendly, welcoming cities anywhere (and if you get tired, public buses and the BART subway system accommodate bikes).

Blazing Saddles has a score of different road, hybrid and mountain bikes and types, starting at $8/hour or $32 for a 24-hour day; the best bike for biking the Bridge is a deluxe comfort hybrid, $9/hr, $36/for a 24-hour day; the e-Blazer ranges from $48-88.

Blazing Saddles Bike Rentals and Tours, 2715 Hyde Street, San Francisco, CA 94109, 415-202-8888, www.blazingsaddles.com 

Maritime National Historical Park 

Besides all the marvelous tourist places – souvenir shops, eateries of every stripe – there are some excellent attractions at Fisherman’s Wharf, such as the Exploratorium and the Aquarium and most especially the famous and fabulous Cable Car (expect long lines of about 30 minutes but totally worth it; along the cable car route, there is the Cable Car Museum which is free and SO fantastic).

The lens from the Farallon Lighthouse is on view at the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park visitor center © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

The end of Fisherman’s Wharf is the start of the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park and the Visitor Center which is free and fantastic (located in the Argonaut Hotel building). Here you experience the sights, sounds and textures of the city’s seafaring past, beginning with the Native Americans who lived here before the Spanish arrived. There are hands-on activities and exhibits that describe the Gold Rush, shipwrecks, and development of San Francisco. On view is the lens from the Farallon Lighthouse. There are many historic vessels along the Hyde Street Pier, where park staff volunteers lead programs where you get to participate (school children can even overnight on historic vessels).  The Maritime Museum is in the Aquatic Park Boathouse building (also free). (San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park, Fort Mason Center, San Francisco, 94123, 415-447-5000, www.nps.gov/safr).

I stop in on my way to picking up the bike from Blazing Saddles, and the exhibit gives me an excellent foundation for appreciating what I will see during the ride.

Riding San Francisco’s famous cable car © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

It’s also where a few of the marvelous San Francisco cable cars begin and end – be prepared for a 20-30 minute wait on a line but it is so worth it and is an excellent way to either arrive at Fisherman’s Wharf or finish off the day. The one-way fare is $7. (Locals can’t get on so it is almost exclusively tourists who ride the cable car.)

Also try to visit the Cable Car Museum, located in the historic Washington/Mason cable car barn and powerhouse. (Cable Car Museum, 1201 Mason Street, San Francisco, CA 94108, 415-474-1887, www.cablecarmuseum.org. See story A Day in San Francisco Revisiting the Past: Plucky Cable Car Epitomizes City’s Grit, Determination, Innovation)

Pier Market Seafood Restaurant at Pier 39 

Pier 39, which is celebrating its 39th anniversary in 2017, is a tourist mecca with scores of fun shops and restaurants such as the Hard Rock Café (especially fun during this Summer of Love celebration, we noticed live music going on; also, check out the autographed Grateful Dead guitar, a painting of Jerry Garcia by Grace Slick of the Jefferson Airplane, Jerry Garcia’s bomber jacket, Jimi Hendrix’ jacket and one of the last photos of Janice Joplin, www.hardrock.com/cafes/san-francisco/).

This trip we enjoyed dinner at the Pier Market Seafood Restaurant, heralded for its New England clam chowder, Mesquite-grilled seafood, and lovely setting with views of the Bay, waterfront and resident sea lions.

Pier Market Seafood is one of the Simmons family’s restaurants in San Francisco (Fog Harbor Fish House, and Wipeout Bar & Grill are the others), offering menus that showcase all sustainable seafood offerings aligned with the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s “Seafood Watch” guidelines.

“We undertook this transition based on a commitment to best practices, even in the absence of any specific demand from our customers,” Scooter Simmons commented. “It was important to our family and everyone in our company to do the right thing and lead by example. There are surprisingly few area restaurants that have made this choice.”

Three generations of Simmons’ are a part of the history of San Francisco’s hospitality industry. Warren Simmons was the creator and developer of PIER 39, which opened in 1978, and his son, Scooter, daughter-in-law, Nancy, and his grandchildren, Nicki and Ryan, now work running the four Pier 39 businesses still owned by the family.

Menu highlights include garlic roasted whole crab, fresh seafood cioppino, mesquite grilled lobster tail, red curry steamed mussels, and Anchor Steam battered fish and chips and Pier Market’s award winning clam chowder.

In addition to the sourcing of sustainable ingredients for all seafood dishes the menu reflects seasonality, the use of local purveyors, generous portions, and moderate (“non-tourist”) pricing (mains are priced from around $11 to $30). Pier Market Seafood offers a diverse selection of libations including a wine list that emphasizes California vintages and handcrafted classic, contemporary and signature cocktails, plus intriguing non-alcoholic beverages including a strawberry basil nojito.

The selections are wonderful for sharing, especially the starters like sourdough garlic bread, garlic fries (crispy fries tossed with fresh garlic, herbs and topped with parmesan cheese); Crispy Scallops (house-breaded and served with roasted jalapeño aioli); fried calamari coated with sweet & sour sauce; crab cakes, a house specialty, served with a Cajun rémoulade; clams steamed in garlic, butter and white wine; steamed mussels prepared with onions and peppers in a red curry coconut broth.

Pier Market Seafood at Pier 39 is very proud of its Cioppino, a classic San Francisco dish © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

The restaurant is also very proud of its Cioppino, a  classic San Francisco dish, a tomato based seafood stew with fresh fish, mussels, clams, shrimp and crab served over pasta ( for a few dollars more, they remove the crab from the shell).

The menu offers tremendous variety and selections – meats to salads, sandwiches, pastas – and the ambiance is casual, pubbish, perfect after a day of sightseeing. The restaurant serves until 10 pm.

One hour free validated parking in an easily accessed and conveniently located garage adds to the allure of the dining experience.

(Pier Market Seafood, Pier 39. San Francisco, CA 94133, 415-989-7437, piermarket.com/).

For more help planning a visit to San Francisco, contact San Francisco Travel. 415-391‑2000, www.sftravel.com. 

See also:

San Francisco Throwing Year-Long 50th Anniversary Celebration of Summer of Love – Be Prepared to Be Blasted into the Past

San Francisco Goes All Out With Special Events, Exhibitions Marking 50th Anniversary of Summer of Love

A Day in San Francisco Revisiting the Past: Plucky Cable Car Epitomizes City’s Grit, Determination, Innovation

____________________

© 2017 Travel Features Syndicate, a division of Workstyles, Inc. All rights reserved. Visit goingplacesfarandnear.com www.huffingtonpost.com/author/karen-rubin , and travelwritersmagazine.com/TravelFeaturesSyndicate/. Blogging at goingplacesnearandfar.wordpress.com and moralcompasstravel.info. Send comments or questions to [email protected]. Tweet @TravelFeatures. ‘Like’ us at facebook.com/NewsPhotoFeatures

 

 

San Francisco Goes All Out With Special Events, Exhibitions Marking 50th Anniversary of Summer of Love

Blast from the past: reliving 1967 through poster art at San Francisco’s de Young Museum’s The Summer of Love Experience: Art, Fashion, and Rock & Roll on view through August 20 © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

By Karen Rubin,

Travel Features Syndicate, goingplacesfarandnear.com

 Wes Leslie’s Wild San Francisco Summer of Love Musical Walking Tour finishes only a couple of blocks down from the entrance to Golden Gate Park (see story), which played such a role in the Hippie Movement, and where the De Young Museum is holding the Summer of Love Experience, one of the more than 60 events, exhibitions, concerts, tours and attractions taking place during this 50th Anniversary of the cosmic 1967 event when some 100,000 young people descended on the city. So, after walking around the famous Haight-Ashbury district – epicenter of the Hippie Movement – taking in the shops and scenes that slingshot you back to the 1960s, I stroll into Golden Gate Park to the museum.

The Summer of Love Experience: Art, Fashion, and Rock & Roll, on view at the De Young Museum in Golden Gate Park through August 20, 2017, is an exhilarating exhibition of iconic rock posters, photographs, interactive music and light shows, costumes and textiles, ephemera, and avant-garde films. Part of the 50th anniversary celebration of the adventurous and colorful counterculture that blossomed in the years surrounding the legendary San Francisco summer of 1967, the exhibition presents more than 300  significant cultural artifacts of the time, including almost 150 objects from the Fine Arts Museums’ extensive permanent holdings, supplemented by key, iconic loans.

Pictoral iconic pins greet you as you enter San Francisco’s de Young Museum’s The Summer of Love Experience: Art, Fashion, and Rock & Roll © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

As you walk in, you are immediately set on the crossroads  of Haight and Ashbury streets and the pins with the iconic phrases and issues that were top-of-mind of the time.

You literally step into the whirling dervish that was the times – psychedelic colored lights and brash, electrified music of Janis Joplin and others provide the beat and backdrop for the exhibit that includes a two-story square darkened room with colored projections of what appear to be the shapes inside a lava lamp and bean-bags to sit on.

Psychedelic experience in the de Young Museum © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

In the mid-1960s, artists, activists, writers, and musicians converged on Haight-Ashbury with hopes of creating a new social paradigm. By 1967, the neighborhood drew as many as 100,000 young people from all over the country to this tiny neighborhood, which became the epicenter for their activities, and nearby Golden Gate Park their playground.

The period was marked by groundbreaking developments in art, fashion, music, and politics (captured in the images of photojournalists and street photographers), which is what is so eloquently showcased in this exhibit.

Have you seen? Thousands of young people ran away from their homes to come to Haight-Ashbury during 1967 © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

Local bands such as Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead were the progenitors of what would become known as the “San Francisco Sound,” music that found its visual counterpart in creative industries that sprang up throughout the region. Rock-poster artists such as Rick Griffin, Alton Kelley, Victor Moscoso, Stanley Mouse, and Wes Wilson generated an exciting array of distinctive works featuring distorted hand-lettering and vibrating colors, while wildly creative light shows, such as those by Bill Ham and Ben Van Meter, served as expressions of the new psychedelic impulse.

Distinctive codes of dress also set members of the Bay Area counterculture apart from mainstream America. Local designers began to create fantastic looks using a range of techniques and materials, including leatherwork, hand-painting, knitting and crotchet, embroidery, repurposed denim, and tie-dye. These innovators included Birgitta Bjerke, aka 100% Birgitta; Mickey McGowan, aka the Apple Cobbler; Burray Olson; and Jeanne Rose – whose creations are also on view.

De Young Museum exhibit explores fashion that came out of San Francisco’s Hippie Movement © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

The Summer of Love Experience: Art, Fashion, and Rock & Roll commemorates an “only in San Francisco” social and aesthetic movement, and will remind museum visitors that in a time of international upheaval, the city played a vital role in changing society and amplifying the pulse of the nation. 

de Young Museum, Golden Gate Park, 50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Drive, San Francisco, CA 94118, 415-750-3600, ttps://deyoung.famsf.org/summer-love-art-fashion-and-rock-roll.

San Francisco Goes All-Out for Summer of Love Celebration 

San Francisco Travel, the city’s visitors bureau, and the California Historical Society have joined forces on the 50th anniversary of the Summer of Love, offering more than 60 exhibitions and events, plus special tours like Wild SF’s Summer of Love walking tour.

At www.summerof.love, the California Historical Society provides the detailed factual and cultural context for this seminal summer through its own exhibition and work with cultural partners such as the de Young Museum.

San Francisco is going all out with special events, exhibitions marking the 50th Anniversary of the Summer of Love, such as the de Young Museum’s Summer of Love Experience: Art, Fashion, and Rock & Roll © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Here are more:

“The Hippies” at West County Museum in Sebastopol (Thru-Dec. 2017): The West County Museum in Sebastopol presents “The Hippies”.   The curators have collected memorabilia from the Hippie elders to recreate the environment that these rebels against consumerism and conformity built in the forests of Graton and Occidental 1966-1973.  Morning Star Ranch in Graton was owned by Lou Gottlieb, the bassist of The Limeliters, a hit folk group of the 60’s. He opened his property to all and refugees from the Haight quickly settled in. They built their own shacks, lived without electricity and often clothes and exchanged the work ethic for the ethics of living in nature in a state of “voluntary primitivism.” Sex and drugs, pot and LSD, guitars and any handy noise makers were freely enjoyed by the denizens but not by all of their neighbors. The County Sheriff and Health Department became involved after vociferous complaints and after many fines and much legal maneuvering by Gottlieb to keep his commune open, the County bulldozers destroyed the huts, and the suddenly homeless hippies were forced to relocate.  Some moved to Morning Star East in New Mexico, but others went a few miles away in Occidental where Bill Wheeler felt that he had enough land to share and the hippies moved in. The land was free to all but the living was too free for a neighbor who felt that the lifestyle was a threat to his children. Again, after legal action, the bulldozers moved in and the hippie commune era in Sonoma County came to an end.  The West County Museum, 261 S. Main Street, Sebastopol, is open Thursday to Sunday, from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.

Monterey Regional Airport: “Feeling Groovy,” Art at the Airport (Thru  Fall 2017): The exhibit showcases collections that reflect music, entertainment and home life in 1960s Monterey County.  Artifacts featured in the exhibit are diverse, ranging from the ordinary to the extraordinary. Visitors can view everyday objects from a 1960s kitchen, iconic fashions ranging from pill box hats to Beatle boots, and beloved games, toys and comic books. See Nancy Carlen’s collection from the Big Sur Folk Festival, the first time these rare photographs and objects have been exhibited. Go back to June 1967 when the Monterey Pop Festival welcomed Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and Otis Redding – and ushered in The Summer of Love. Each object – from transistor radios to martini glasses – will transport you back to this transformative decade.

2017 Summer of Love Street Celebrations with It’s Your District and Sunday Streets (Thru Oct. 1, 2017): In conjunction with Sunday Streets, the non-profit It’s Your District (IYD) is hosting the 2017 Summer of Love Street Celebrations. Block parties will be held at the eight Sunday Street locations, and will include Summer of Love exhibitions, art projects, live performances and family-friendly activities. In keeping with IYD’s mission, these celebrations will bring in and promote Bay Area non-profits, businesses, arts, cultural and community organizations, socially conscious enterprises and individuals who are committed to bringing forth the unheard voices of residents and in sustaining the vitality of our community district by district. Sunday Streets engages some 120,000 people annually and this number continues to grow.

One highlight of the celebration is the Public Mural Art Project which creates murals designed to educate members of the community about the history of their respective neighborhoods. The art will focus on prominent heroes and the events that have contributed to the development of San Francisco districts from the 1960s to present day.

Lavender-Tinted Glasses: A Groovy Gay Look at the Summer of Love” at the GLBT History Museum (April 7-Sept. 27, 2017): An exhibition highlighting the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender participants in the 1967 Summer of Love in San Francisco. The show also will explore the LGBTQ community’s own simultaneous cultural revolution in the city’s Tenderloin neighborhood. The stories of queer poets, philosophers, filmmakers and musicians integral to the era will be celebrated through historic photographs, artwork, film and documents from the archives of the GLBT Historical Society and private collections.

De Young Museum, San Francisco, presents Summer of Love Experience: Art, Fashion, and Rock & Roll © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

de Young Museum; “The Summer of Love Experience: Art, Fashion and Rock & Roll” (April 8-Aug. 20, 2017): Through a wide array of iconic rock posters, interactive music and light shows, “out-of-this-world” clothing and photographs, “Summer of Love” celebrates the city’s rebellious and colorful counterculture and explores the visual and material cultures of a generation searching for personal fulfillment through social change. The exhibition includes rock posters by artists including Victor Moscoso, Stanley Mouse and Wes Wilson along with examples of the handcrafted, one-of-a-kind garments created by such designers as Brigitta Bjerke, K. Lee Manuel and Jeanne Rose.

“Love or Confusion: Jimi Hendrix in 1967” at the Museum of the African Diaspora (MoAD) (April 26-Aug. 27, 2017): As Jimi Hendrix walked out onto the stage at Monterey Pop, he was also stepping out for his American rock and roll debut. Playing as “The Jimi Hendrix Experience,” Hendrix was introduced to California at the festival before the U.S. release of his first album. A performance enlivened with rock theatrics, sexual flamboyance and magnetic guitar riffs, this moment solidified Hendrix as a rock idol. An integrated band with a black front man, “The Jimi Hendrix Experience” represented racial and sexual freedom and the goals of the 1906s counterculture.  Composed of photographs taken of Jimi Hendrix in 1967, this exhibition celebrates the 50th anniversary of the famous Summer of Love and the introduction of Jimi Hendrix as one the greatest instrumentalists of all time.

“Elaine Mayes: It Happened in Monterey” at SFO Museum (May 4-Aug. 10, 2017): SFO Museum will present an exhibition of photographs by Elaine Mayes (whose work is also included in the de Young Museum exhibit) taken at the Summer of Love’s legendary rock concert, the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival.  The exhibition is located post-security in Terminal 3.

California Historical Society; “On the Road to the Summer of Love (May 12-Sept. 10, 2017): Guest-curated by Grateful Dead historian Dennis McNally, this photographic exhibition will start in the 1950’s with “HOWL” and the Beat Generation and move through the free speech movement to LSD, rock and roll and the Haight in the 60’s.

The Cartoon Art Museum; “Comix from the Summer of Love(June-Sept., 2017): The Cartoon Art Museum celebrates the Summer of Love with a selection of underground comix from Bay Area creators Lee Marrs (Pudge, Girl Blimp), Trina Robbins (Wimmen¹s Comix) and highlights from the collection of Ron Turner, founder of famed San Francisco publisher Last Gasp.

“A Night with Janis Joplin” at American Conservatory Theater (June 7-July 2, 2017): Like a comet that burns far too brightly to last, Janis Joplin exploded onto the music scene in 1967 and, almost overnight, became the queen of rock ’n’ roll. The unmistakable voice, laced with raw emotion and Southern Comfort, made her a must-see headliner from Monterey to Woodstock. A.C.T. presents an evening with the woman and her influences in the Bay Area premiere of the hit Broadway musical “A Night with Janis Joplin” at the Geary Theater.   Fueled by such unforgettable songs as “Me and Bobby McGee,” “Piece of My Heart,” “Mercedes Benz,” “Cry Baby,” and “Summertime,” a remarkable cast and breakout performances.

San Francisco Public Library: 50th Anniversary of Love and Haight (July 15-Oct. 29, 2017): In this exhibit, historical photographs, grass roots newspapers, posters and flyers, record albums and manuscript materials from community groups and City of San Francisco collections will document the social and political upheaval of the summer of 1967 and how the city responded.

Attractions:

The legendary Fillmore Auditorium offers performances throughout the year and launched the careers of greats including James Brown, Ike and Tina Turner, the Grateful Dead, the Jefferson Airplane, Santana and more. Famous for printing posters for every single show played at the venue, the poster room is just shy of 1,000 posters since officially opening its doors in the mid-60s. Celebrate the 50th anniversary of Bill Graham’s first show at the Fillmore, which was December 10, 1965. (http://thefillmore.com/about/)

Harkening back to The Psychedelic Shop, which opened on January 3, 1966, as the first head shop in America, Love on Haight is a boutique dedicated to keeping the memory of the Summer of Love alive (www.loveonhaightsf.com).

You can see music memorabilia of Grateful Dead and other notables from the 1967 Summer of Love at the Hard Rock Café at Pier 39 © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Check out the autographed Grateful Dead guitar, a painting of Jerry Garcia by Grace Slick of the Jefferson Airplane, Jerry Garcia’s bomber jacket, Jimi Hendrix’ jacket and one of the last photos of Janice Joplin. at the Hard Rock Café at PIER 39. www.hardrock.com/cafes/san-francisco/

At Madame Tussauds, rub shoulders with iconic stars and free thinkers of the Summer of Love such as Jerry Garcia, Janis Joplin, Carlos Santana and Steve Jobs. (www.madametussauds.com)

Founded in 1959 with avant-garde performance events, today The San Francisco Mime Troupe (SFMT) produces social and politically relevant theater performances full of dance, song, satire and comedy all year long. In 1965 future rock impresario Bill Graham, then the company’s business manager, organized his first rock dance/light show at the Fillmore Auditorium as a bail benefit for the SFMT and in 1967 The Troupe clinched its radical reputation with a comedy updated to satirize the Vietnam War (www.sfmt.org/company).

Viceroy Hotel Group’s brand new Hotel Zeppelin has been reinvented as a modern take on the countercultural rebellion of the 1960s. Its historic architecture dating back to 1918 is highlighted with Instagram worthy design elements that truly exude the Summer of Love vibe. From the Giant 12 foot (and climbable) Peace Sign constructed of repurposed license plates from roadtrips long forgotten, to blacklight graffiti murals fading in and out of view at their Fireside neighborhood bar – even the guest rooms feature vintage Bill Graham posters and rockband clad wallpaper that will transport you straight to the 1960s Fillmore. Grab a drink at their signature bar and restaurant Rambler and meander your way down to their massive “Den” arcade featuring vintage games like shuffleboard, skeeball, quick shot basketball, bingo and more (www.viceroyhotelsandresorts.com/en/zeppelin).

S.O.U.L. (Summer of Unconditional LOVE), a new, non-profit, online media organization, chronicles the happenings of the 50th Anniversary of the Summer of Love, with a focus on broadcasting stories of individuals and organizations implementing solutions inspired by the ideals and wisdom of the 60’s cultural movements. The information shared is intended to help people manifest a more loving and less fearful world by giving them hope and inspiring new action to be taken.  “Come join us, and discover what you can do to participate in accelerating humanity’s shift into the Love Paradigm,” say Founders Evan Hirsch and Kip Baldwin www.nowsharelove.org).

To help visitors plan their “trip,” the San Francisco Travel Association has launched a special website, www.summeroflove2017.com, which provides an ever-expanding guide to the whole groovy scene, including events and itinerary ideas.  (San Francisco Travel. 415-391‑2000, www.sftravel.com)

See also:

San Francisco Throwing Year-Long 50th Anniversary Celebration of Summer of Love – Be Prepared to Be Blasted into the Past

____________________

© 2017 Travel Features Syndicate, a division of Workstyles, Inc. All rights reserved. Visit goingplacesfarandnear.com www.huffingtonpost.com/author/karen-rubin , and travelwritersmagazine.com/TravelFeaturesSyndicate/. Blogging at goingplacesnearandfar.wordpress.com and moralcompasstravel.info. Send comments or questions to [email protected]. Tweet @TravelFeatures. ‘Like’ us at facebook.com/NewsPhotoFeatures

San Francisco Throwing Year-Long 50th Anniversary Celebration of Summer of Love – Be Prepared to Be Blasted into the Past

Wes Leslie, co founder of Wild San Francisco tours, is offering Haight-Ashbury Walking Tour: A Musical Trip of The 60’s for free during the 50th Anniversary of the Summer of Love © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

By Karen Rubin, Travel Features Syndicate, goingplacesfarandnear.com

My, how time flies!

It’s the 50th anniversary of San Francisco’s Summer of Love, when, in 1967, nearly 100,000 young people converged on the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood, turning San Francisco into the epicenter of a cultural phenomenon known as the Summer of Love. It was a transformative time, when music, fashion, art and new ideas flourished and there was a feeling that everything was possible.

“The city of San Francisco was a magnet for musicians, artists and social rebels in the mid-to-late 1960s. They created a counterculture bound by leftist politics, tribal spirit, music and art. Long stamped a literary bohemia, attracting nonconformists like the Beat Generation writers of the Fifties, it was a natural progression for free-thinking San Francisco to give birth to a radical new movement eventually embraced by the rest of the world.”

The 50th Anniversary Celebration – with some 60 different events, special tours, concerts – is already  well underway in San Francisco and I’m guessing that tens of thousands of Baby Boomers will grab their tie-dye t-shirts, bell-bottom jeans, and put a flower in their hair and join in for a mind-blowing time-travel blast back into the past.

You feel you are in a time warp in Haight-Ashbury district, celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Summer of Love © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

I’ve just returned from my own magical mystery tour – more precisely, Haight-Ashbury Walking Tour: A Musical Trip of The 60’s, a musical Summer of Love walking tour with Wes Leslie of Wild San Francisco Tours – when I was stunningly, and eerily transported back to my past.

Let me say at the outset that I can’t recall taking a historical tour where I personally lived the history.

Wes (he jokes that he is called “Wild Wes”) is perfect to lead this tour, using his guitar at opportune points – in front of the homes where the Jerry Garcia and the Grateful Dead, Janis Joplin, Country Joe (of the Fish) and others lived – to recreate the iconic music of that era. What is more, in keeping with the spirit of the Hippie Movement, the tour during this anniversary year is “free” (you pay a suggested donation at the end).

Though I lived through that era – memories came flooding back with Wes’ narration – there is so much more of the inside, behind-the-scenes, backstage stuff that I hadn’t known. It is kind of like sitting around a table with relatives and finding out inside scoop you hadn’t realized went on.

Wes’ anecdotes and folksy style make the tour as entertaining and fun as it is informative from a historical and cultural point of view.

Earthsong shop on Haight Street © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

What I come away with is a realization that the Summer of Love would not have happened without The Pill and how that spurred cultural changes – most significantly a willingness to challenge the entrenched White Patriarchy and Power Structure. I come away with is a new appreciation of how the Women’s Liberation movement actually fueled the Hippie movement, which, through its counter-cultural, anti-establishment, anti-institutionalism, then paved the way for civil rights, gay rights and peace movements – methods and organizations and themes which are eerily resurgent today.

During this Wild San Francisco walking tour through Haight-Ashbury (with music!), I learn about the rise – and fall– of the Hippie Movement that reached its pinnacle during that Summer of Love, when some 100,000 descended and overwhelmed San Francisco (consider that the city has a population today of 800,000), much to the horror of local Hippies who decried that famous song, “If you’re going to San Francisco, be sure to wear flowers in your hair.”

The popularity of “If you’re going to San Francisco/Be sure to wear some flowers in your hair,” Scott McKenzie’s song, contributed to the undoing of the Hippie Movement in Haight-Ashbury after the 1967 Summer of Love © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

The very “success” of the Summer of Love proved the undoing of the Hippie Movement, much to the delight of Mayor Shelley at the time, who went after the hippies with such vengeance that he told area hospitals not to help young runaway teens who OD’d, and told the police to stand down so that chaos would reign. It is a complete surprise to me to learn about how brief this movement was in Haight-Ashbury – like a brief, shining light.

The Hippie Movement, which emerged 1965-1967, was aimed at overturning the 1950s culture of uniformity, conformity and obeisance to The Man (whether that is the Capitalist or the Authority of the white patriarchy power elite). The “Hippies” (named because they were the next-gen Beatniks but not quite the Hipsters the Beatniks were, according to San Francisco Chronicle columnist Herb Caen who coined the names for both) renounced capitalism and embraced everything “free” (free food, free concerts, free health clinics, free love), which is why they were considered so dangerously radical (Communists!) and vilified by The Establishment. After all, America was still in the throes of the Cold War.

The social, political ideologues shaping the movement were The Diggers, Wes explains (a group I had never heard of before even though I lived through this era) and must have been news to the other people on our tour, who hailed from Wales, Australia, Hungary, Berlin and Los Angeles (that fellow had taken two other tours with Wes).

San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury district has the most magnificent surviving Victorian-era homes, like the one known locally as Hippie Temptation © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

The Haight-Ashbury district, where the Hippies were concentrated, today seems an odd locale for these counter-culture radicals, because this district is dominated by the most magnificently preserved (expensive!) Victorian-era homes, some dating from the 1890s, surviving the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire which destroyed 80 percent of the city. Wes explains that by the 1960s, the district was run-down and cheap to live in after white flight to the suburbs. Back then, you could rent an entire Victorian house for $175 a month and divide that among 10 people (amounting to $80 a month per person in today’s money, compared to the $3400/month rent for an apartment the district now commands). So naturally, it attracted artists, writers and musicians.

In the 1960s, half the American population was under 25 years old. These were the Baby Boomers and they were coming of age, disillusioned with income inequality, segregation, the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

“Maybe they hadn’t figured out the solutions but they wanted whatever was furthest from whatever set those things into motion,” Wes tells us as we face one of the most magnificent Victorians, known as “Hippie Temptation”, so they reclaimed the derelict urban cities, swore off capitalism, and embraced drugs that were emerging and love and a philosophy of individual discovery and expression.

They picked up where Jack Kerouac (“On the Road” was a handbook for the Beat Generation) and Alan Ginsberg (“Howl”) left off.

Wes Leslie across from pink house where Janis Joplin used to live in Haight-Ashbury © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

The emergence of drugs (and the drug culture) was a significant element that led to the rise of the Hippie Movement– like LSD (which was legal), which led to the rise of “psychedelic” experimentation and provided the subtext for culture of “seeing the world in a new way” and a devotion to individual expression, rather than conformity. “Turn on, tune in, drop out,” declared Timothy Leary.

The Diggers, Wes explains, took their name from a 17th century group of anarchists in England who would take over unplowed fields and would give away the harvest to end inequality.

San Francisco didn’t have farms, but it did have food waste, so the Diggers would go dumpster diving and brought the food to All Saints Parish Church (where we find ourselves standing) and would make a pot of Hippie Stew which they would bring to Panhandle Park (where our tour began, named for the shape, not for handouts), to distribute for free. (The church still gives away food weekly.).

One day, The Diggers gave away free food on the steps of City Hall, which enraged San Francisco’s mayor. “’We are not a charity,’ the Diggers declared,” Wes tells us. “’We are an anarchist organization doing what government should do’.” (a philosophy that is reemergent with the anti-Trump activism) It was the act of it, in contrast to the liberals at Berkeley, the intellectual kids, who were theorizing.

“The Diggers said, ‘Just do it, don’t theorize.’ The Diggers started putting ‘free’ in front of everything: free food, free concerts, free health care.”

San Francisco’s famous Haight-Ashbury district has resurrected the psychedelic look and feel of its mid-1960s heyday © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Wes traces the actual beginning of the Hippie Movement that led up to the Summer of Love to “The Death of Money” March the Diggers put on. The Diggers, he says, were the activist branch of the San Francisco Mime Troupe, a political satire and theater group.

Hundreds came out wearing dark clothing and carrying a coffin filled with cash and coins – “50 years before the Occupy Wall Street movement and Bitcoin.”

They opened a free store, stocked with contributions from shopkeepers and what they could scavenge. Tie-dye? That gender-bending fashion innovation developed, Wes says, because the Diggers would get contributions of white shirts and would die them.

Interestingly, Wes points out, there was a revolution within the Diggers because the men were writing the manifestos but the women were actually doing the work.

Ultimately, he relates, “the structure of the Diggers – who eschewed “leadership” (they were anarchists) – falls apart.” But they will be forever remembered for coining the famous phrase: “Today marks the first day of the rest of your life.” And for providing the template for social innovations that followed.

Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead, still beloved in Haight-Ashbury, immortalized in a mural © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

By now, we are standing in front of the most famous house in Haight-Ashbury: the “crash pad” for the Grateful Dead, the most beloved group in San Francisco, “hallowed ground for Haight-Ashbury.”

As Wes is talking, a 60ish man in long white beard, long flowing hair, wearing a tie-dye shirt and bright colored vest comes out of his bright colored house and into his red car, looking every bit the part.

Wes regales us with stories about Jerry Garcia, the Grateful Dead, the Hells Angels, Country Joe and the Fish, Janis Joplin as we visit their houses and important landmarks.

The Hippie Movement had its “greatest moment” not in the Summer of Love, but in January 1967, with a Human “Be-In” in Golden Gate Park. It was supposed to attract a few hundred people. Instead, some 20,000 turned out. The Diggers provided free food; the Hells Angels provided child care, Wes says. (Photos of the event are on view at the De Young Museum in Golden Gate Park, which this season has a special “Summer of Love Experience” exhibit.)

Kids 12 to 14 years old were running away from home to join the Haight-Ashbury scene, and they were overdosing on the ubiquitous drugs.

“Wild Wes” of Wild San Francisco Tours relates the history of Haight-Asbury’s free clinic during his musical walking tour of the district © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Dr. David Smith, who was then a 28-year old medical intern (he still lives here), decided to do something and opened a free medical clinic in June 1967, which despite Mayor Jack Shelley’s efforts to shut it down, actually still exists (as we discover that we are standing in front of it) and has served as the model for some 2,000 free clinics since.

As the Summer of Love event approached, the city was freaking out at what would likely be an invasion of some 50,000 (the museum says 100,000 came). Mayor Shelley shut down the clinic and the police, hoping people would be turned off from coming.

Instead, the locals who occupied those Victorian houses turned over their keys to The Diggers, so that the visitors would have some place to sleep, and left town themselves. The Diggers opened “The Switchboard” putting visitors in touch with apartments (sounds like a forerunner of Air BnB), with jobs, and provided a central place for parents to send messages to their runaway kids.

The “success” of the Summer of Love was actually the undoing of the movement, which unraveled after that, Wes explains.

The Grateful Dead left, the Hippies moved to North Bay where they created a farming commune, the Diggers disbanded.

“The Last Hurrah was the ‘Death of Hippies’ march” paralleling the “Death of Money” march which initiated the movement. The Diggers, again wearing dark clothing, carried another coffin, this time with a Hippie inside, covered with flowers and incense.

The Hippie Movement, they said, “was killed off by fame,” adding, “If you care about this, take what you learned and radicalize it.”

Indeed, they did: the Hippies willingness to take on the Establishment unleashed the Women’s Movement, the Civil Rights Movement, Gay Rights Movement and Peace Movement.

Amoeba Records, world’s largest independent record store, still has its psychedelic location at 1855 Haight Street © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

But Haight-Ashbury sunk further and further into decline, becoming an outright derelict and dangerous place, until the Dot.Com resurgence of San Francisco in the early 2000s, and tourism which has resurrected the colorfully decorated shops, including Earthsong, and Amoeba (which Wes says is the world’s largest independent record-album store).

Wild San Francisco’s other tours – such as “Radical SF”, a walking tour through the Mission and Castro districts – are focused on the people’s history and social movements (there is also a historical ghost tour for good measure).

Wild San Francisco’s co-founder Wes Leslie is a third-generation San Francisco Bay native (I admire his ring with the insignia of the Golden Gate Bridge and 3 diamonds, which he tells me was his grandfather’s, a transit driver for 3 decades). He makes “bedroom soul” music as Wes Leslie, the Bedroom Player (wesleslie.com) and fixes cocktails at Mrs. Jones on Market Street.

Contact Wild San Francisco Tours, 415-580-1849, http://wildsftours.com/, [email protected]

Special Tours Celebrate Summer of Love Anniversary 

2017, the 50th Anniversary of the Summer of Love, is being marked with a year-long celebration of San Francisco’s counter culture with a 1960s throwback including some 60 exhibitions, performances, literary events, tribute concerts and recognition of significant moments in time.

While the Summer of Love remains a key moment in history, the free love movement can be experienced through a number of geography specific tours, neighborhoods and performances throughout the year.  In addition to Wild San Francisco’s offerings, other tours include:

A variety of San Francisco tour companies are offering special Summer of Love programs through Haight-Ashbury district in 2017© 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Flower Power Walking Tours: Walk in the footsteps of Janice Joplin and the Grateful Dead on the Haight Ashbury Flower Power Walking Tours touching on the history of it all, from rock and roll to art, fashion and architecture. (www.haightashburytour.com/)

FOOT! Fun Walking Tours:  is presenting a special tour, Flashback: From the Summer of Love to the Winter of Discontent, from the highs of the summer of 1967 to the restlessness that followed. Follow in the footsteps of music legends like Janis Joplin and Jerry Garcia with this walking tour in the iconic Haight Ashbury neighborhood.(www.foottours.com).

San Francisco City Guides Haight-Ashbury Tour: Explore streets, sidewalks, parks and vistas that tell the story of a Victorian era resort site subsequently developed by comfortable merchants, whose gingerbread homes still grace its streets. Offered most Sundays, see website for details.  Somewhat strenuous.    San Francisco City Guides offers free (donations welcome), volunteer-led tours of a variety of neighborhoods, landmarks and topics. To bring eight or more walkers to a regular tour, click here for information on private group tours. (www.sfcityguides.org, [email protected].

Detour’s Walking Tour: Walk through the epicenter of the Summer of Love with Detour’s Walking Tour of the Haight, narrated by one of the activists who was at its center, Peter Coyote. (www.detour.com/san-francisco/haight-ashbury).

Avital Food Tours, Haight Ashbury: Did you know that local food co-ops were born out of this era? Delve into one of the world’s best food scenes to hear the stories of restaurant owners, chefs and industry experts for a culinary experience in San Francisco.  Walking tours are available in iconic neighborhoods across the city including Haight Ashbury (http://avitaltours.com/san-francisco/).

San Francisco Love Tours: Ride a VW hippie bus with San Francisco Love Tours and experience modern day San Francisco infused with the spirit of the 60’s (http://sanfranciscolovetours.com/).

Magic Bus Experience: This two-hour+ adventure, “Time Machine to the 60’s,” is a “mind-bending” combination of professional theater, film, music and sightseeing that allows tour goers to travel back in time to the summer of 1967.  The Magic Bus is an actual bus colorfully painted and filled with a sound system, micro projectors and screens that periodically lower over the windows making the bus into a moving movie theater (http://magicbussf.com).

To help visitors plan their “trip,” the San Francisco Travel Association has launched a special website, www.summeroflove2017.com, which provides an ever-expanding guide to the whole groovy scene, including events and itinerary ideas. (San Francisco Travel. 415-391‑2000, www.sftravel.com)

Next: Special Events, Exhibitions Planned for San Francisco’s 50th Anniversary Summer of Love

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© 2017 Travel Features Syndicate, a division of Workstyles, Inc. All rights reserved. Visit goingplacesfarandnear.com www.huffingtonpost.com/author/karen-rubin , and travelwritersmagazine.com/TravelFeaturesSyndicate/. Blogging at goingplacesnearandfar.wordpress.com and moralcompasstravel.info. Send comments or questions to [email protected]. Tweet @TravelFeatures. ‘Like’ us at facebook.com/NewsPhotoFeatures

 

Born in a Silver Boom, Park City, Utah, Heritage Delights Diners, GalleryStrollers, FestivalGoers

Park City’s historic Main Street has a festive, welcoming ambiance especially with the free, old-timey trolley © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

 

By Karen Rubin, Eric Leiberman & Sarah Falter

Travel Features Syndicate, goingplacesfarandnear.com

 

Like so many, we have come to Park City for its legendary powder snow and sprawling mountain peaks, home to two major ski resorts, Park City (which since Vail Resorts acquired and combined Park City and The Canyons has become the largest ski resort in the US), and the skiers-only, “retro” Deer Valley Resort.

And besides being one of the easiest world-class ski destinations to reach from every part of the country by air (I literally leave my home on Long Island in the morning and am skiing at Park City Mountain by the afternoon), it affords a perfectly delightful, charming historic town that rounds out the joyful experience.

Which is ideal because one of the major delights of a ski (or any outdoors) holiday is dining out. During our all-too brief stay in Park city, we get to sample the diverse venues.

Just a few blocks long, Park City’s historic Main Street really packs it in: one phenomenal gallery, boutique, superb restaurant after another. I visit on three evenings of our four-day stay and find new treasures to explore each time.

Park City was born in a silver mining boom of the 1880s. – today, it extracts a different kind of silver, from tourism – indeed, we are told that Park City has been ranked the most expensive small town in America (surpassing Aspen).

But the 19th century past is still very much on display – I love reading the historic markers outside some of the buildings which collectively tell the story of a town that survived explosions, flooded mineshafts, a town-wide fire in 1898 which burned 200 of the town’s 350 structures, snows heavy enough to collapse buildings, and a devastating downturn in silver prices that deflated the town’s economy in the mid-1900s, so that by 1951, it was officially named a ghost town. (There is quite a good Park City Museum, 528 Main Street, allocate about an hour.) Sixty-four of the Park City buildings are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Meanwhile, there are more than 1,200 miles of tunnels that wind through the mountains (Park City Mountain Resort offers an on-mountain Historic Mountain Tour on skis that goes to some of the mine shafts.). There are other charming touches, like the free old-timey trolley, and the decorative lights that are strung across Main Street and around many of the buildings.

Park City retains its historic charm © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

But out of a silver bust has come a new kind of cash boom: Park City today is considered the “most expensive small town” in America (actually surpassing Aspen) which you sense in the high-end galleries, shops and restaurants. Yet, the ambiance is not in the least snobby or elitist. We are struck by how very welcoming and friendly everybody is – from the shopkeepers to the visitors. The town is one perpetual smile.

There are a mind-boggling number of restaurants to choose from – nearly 150 in the area – from cozy bistros, casual eateries ideal for family gatherings, jazz and live-music venues, and fine dining establishments worthy of Michelin stars.

During our all-too brief stay, we get to sample Park City’s diverse dining options. After all, a ski holiday is one of the few times you can tell yourself, “I’m on vacation, AND I’ve spent the day outside burning up calories.”

The first place to replenish those calories is at Firewood on Main.

Firewood on Main should be a Park City institution. Though it only opened in December 2016, its chef/owner is John Murcko who is responsible for developing many of the fine dining restaurants throughout Park City (The Farm, in the Canyons village and was named one of “Utah’s 25 Best Restaurants” in 2015, is one) and Sun Valley. This is his first restaurant of his own, and you get the feeling it just gives him the freedom to express his passion for culinary creativity. What we love about it is that although the selections and taste combinations are as sophisticated as you might find in the major capital cities of the world, it still is absolutely true, in ingredients and selections (not to mention décor) to its local surroundings. So there are taste sensations that evoke South America (particularly Argentina’s penchant for grilling) and Asia, but that still feel right at home in Utah.

Firewood on Main provides windows into the kitchen © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

Chef Murcko has done some interesting things: like creating the Chef’s Library – a literal tiny, private and separated room connected to the kitchen with a pass-through for the dishes – where you get to create a menu in collaboration with the chef.  There is also a second private dining room, and the Nickel Bar on the basement floor (named for the nickels that fill the bar tabletop) which is appropriately dark and woody.

The main dining room features a set of windows that let you see through to the sprawling kitchen (I like that better than when the kitchen is just open to the dining room). You get to see the activity, as well as marvel at the room-length long open grill, that was custom-built, “the Mazzerati of grills,” our server, Sean, notes.

Just about everything is grilled or seared or fired or smoked in some fashion – even the lemon garnish on the cocktail, to enhance its flavor (more about that in a bit).

I love the décor, which I dub “Mountain Moderne.” It has a quasi-agricultural/industrial heritage motif – clean lines but woodsy – that  summons Utah heritage with windmill fans that are used as ceiling fans and black-and-white photos that decorate the room. Chef Murcko even crafted the tables himself.

We start off with a batch of appetizers that we share:

Grilled Oysters, a popular appetizer at Firewood on Main © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Grilled Oysters with spinach, wood roasted bacon and beet pickled shallot – the oysters are palm-sized huge and are brought in from Washington and Applewood Smoked Burrata with ash roasted beets and herbed pesto; pork belly (for which Firewood is known) prepared with honey wine apple vinegar, red pear and frisee; and fire-braised seasonal wild mushrooms (wood beech, royal trumpets, chanterelles) served with grilled bread. Delectable.

For our mains, we savor Port Short Rib, so succulent and perfectly prepared over creamy polenta, warm dried stone fruit chutney, and heirloom carrots fired on the grill; Rack of Lamb, with black lentil ragu, cipollini onion, eggplant and red chimichurri, had some wonderful Argentinian influences and it too was prepared and presented to perfection; and American Kobe New York (the best of both cultures!) showed off Murcko’s penchant for grilling, was sensational, served with rosemary pave, baby shiitakes and duxelle jus.

Watching chefs create at Firewood on Main © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

That being said, the menu (which basically touches all cylinders of offerings) shifts nightly to incorporate the freshest seasonal ingredients, locally sourced wherever possible. But the one constant is that everything is cooked over a wood fire. “Chef John Murcko’s vision blends the most primitive of cooking methods—open wood flame—with an innovative menu.” (Firewood On Main, 306 Main Street, Park City UT 84060, 435-252-9900, firewoodonmain.com).

High West Saloon and Distillery

One of the most popular places to be in Park City is High West Saloon and Distillery. It has the look of being around a century but was opened in 2006 by David Perkins and his wife, Jane. David, a former biochemist, was inspired to open his own distillery after seeing the parallels between the fermentation and distilling process and his own work in biochemistry during a trip to the Maker’s Mark Distillery in Loretto, Kentucky. The old-timey look comes from the fact that Perkins opened with just a small, 250-gallon still and Saloon in an historic livery stable and garage.

High West Saloon & Distillery is set in an historic livery stable and garage © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

The Saloon features alpine-inspired western fare alongside the original still (you can see it) and the Nelson Cottage offering whiskey-paired dinners. It’s  lots of fun and draws huge crowds willing to wait 2 ½ hours for a table (they don’t mind sampling the product in the meantime and looking at the traditional 1,600 gallon copper pot still, or perusing the small “general store”. Notably, High West was named 2016 Distiller of the Year by Whisky Advocate.

The original still is on view at High West Saloon & Distillery © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

We had a fantastically fresh chicken noodle soup and amazing High West Burger 18, made with a bison and beef blend (wonderfully moist), “proprietary seasoning”, broiled aged gruyere, blue cheese, BBQ glazed sweet onion, crispy fried shallots, served with fries. The Distillery also offers tours, which you can book in advance.

Colorful atmosphere at High West Saloon © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

The new High West Distillery and tasting room is located “high in the Wasatch-Uinta Mountains,” in Wanship, Utah, 25 minutes outside Park City and 40 minutes from Salt Lake City, and is open Wednesday-Sunday, 10 am to 5 pm).

(High West Saloon and Distillery, 703 Park Ave Park City, UT 84060, 435-649-8300, www.highwest.com).

Silver Star Café

We also got to sample Silver Star Café, which is located at one of the bases to Park City Mountain, one of the venues that regularly features live music.

Here, we enjoyed live jazz by the John Flanders Jazz Trio in a most comfortable dining room that made you feel more like being in a living room than a restaurant, with long banquettes and loads of pillows that is clearly a favorite with regulars and locals.

The John Flanders Jazz Trio performing at the Silver Star Café, Park City Mountain © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

We thoroughly enjoyed the freshness and flavor combinations of the appetizers and salad: General Tso’s Pork Belly Wrap prepared with Butter lettuce, pickled chilies, toasted peanuts; Warm Roasted Brussels Sprout Salad with pomegranate seeds, toasted hazelnuts, pickled onion, pomegranate-balsamic dressing; Winter Greens & Apple with radicchio, arugula, endive, candied pecans, grapefruit vinaigrette.

The mains offered wonderful choices:

Pork Osso Bucco (a house specialty), featured Niman Ranch pork shank, fresh tomatillo salsa, coconut creamed corn, Queso Fresco, pork jus; Boneless Buttermilk Fried Half Chicken is prepared in a distinctive way  and served with Red beans & rice, braised greens, Carolina BBQ; Seared Elk Burger, 8 oz. of our signature elk-bacon blend, fig-cherry mostarda, bacon burger sauce, served with hand-cut fries on a toasted Ciabatta bun.

Lost at Sea, the newly created cocktail by James Root, Silver Star Café’s manager and mixologist © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

James Root, the manager who is an award-winning mixologist, let’s us sample a cocktail he had only just devised: “Lost at Sea” contains Beehive Gin, Absinthe, lime and crème de violette with a cherry set at the base of the glass. It is built about Absinthe, a spirit with a colorful reputation of having been banned and therefore embraced by Parisian artists, bohemians and literati like Hemingway (it was falsely accused of having hallucinogenic properties). What I love about it is that it isn’t too sweet but has an air of intrigue. (Silver Star Cafe. 1825 Three Kings Drive Park City, UT 84060. 435-655-3456. [email protected], www.thesilverstarcafe.com)

Galleries Galore

The art galleries are simply breathtaking. The last Friday of each month is a free Park City Gallery Stroll that lets visitors and locals alike the opportunity to enjoy light refreshments while discovering what’s on in the galleries; from 6-9 pm, members of the Park city Gallery Association offer a showcase highlighting artists, special exhibits and art events.

Jake Quarnberg, the hat shaper at Burns Cowboy Shop on historic Main Street, Park City, Utah. Family owned since 1876, one of oldest family owned western shops in US. © Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

At Burns Cowboy Shop on historic Main Street, family owned since 1876, one of oldest family owned western shops in US (the boots just take your breath away),  I meet Jake Quarnberg, the hat shaper, who is steaming a hat and patiently explaining the process to two girls who listen completely enthralled. Quarnberg who used to be a cattle rancher in Utah, grew up with the 6th generation Burns.

Year-Round Destination 

Park City is very much a year-round destination – after the snow melts, the mountain bikers and hikers take over.

Park City offers festivities and festivals year-round, the most famous being the Sundance Film Festival when as many as 40,000 come to town each January (remarkably, few actually ski so the slopes are relatively empty).  But the whole calendar is chock-a-block with special events: beginning in June, the Park silly Summer Market festival, each Sunday, showcasing local produce and artisan crafts; in July,  Independence Day parade, and Park City Food & Wine Festival; in September, Autumn Aloft hot air balloon festival; in October, the Howl-O-Ween dog parade, to list just a few that have built the town’s reputation as the “Festival City of the Rocky Mountains.”  There is also the Park City Institute’s concert series; performances at the picturesque Egyptian Theater (“Annie the Musical” was being performed during our visit).

The famous Egyptian Theater on historic Main Street in Park City © Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

There are more than 100 lodging properties to choose, from on-mountain hotels, condos and full-service luxury hotels with ski-in/out convenience, to multi-family private homes, bed and breakfast inns, downtown properties (you can hop on the Town Lift to the Park City Mountain base).

Park City, Utah is arguably North America’s most accessible mountain recreation destination, just 35 minutes from Salt Lake City International Airport with convenient service from everywhere. Park City – home to Deer Valley Resort and Park City Mountain Resort and the Utah Olympic Park – affords more than 400 miles of public trails offering year-round outdoor recreation.

Excellent travel planning assistance is provided by the Park City Chamber of Commerce, Convention & Visitors Bureau, 800-453-1360, www.visitparkcity.com.

See also:

Park City Mountain, Utah: Biggest Ski Area in US is One of Easiest to Reach

Deer Valley, Utah is Skiers’ Only Paradise with Retro, Refined Vibe

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© 2017 Travel Features Syndicate, a division of Workstyles, Inc. All rights reserved. Visit goingplacesfarandnear.com www.huffingtonpost.com/author/karen-rubin , and travelwritersmagazine.com/TravelFeaturesSyndicate/. Blogging at goingplacesnearandfar.wordpress.com and moralcompasstravel.info. Send comments or questions to [email protected]. Tweet @TravelFeatures. ‘Like’ us at facebook.com/NewsPhotoFeatures

 

Deer Valley, Utah is Skiers’ Only Paradise with Retro, Refined Vibe

Deer Valley Resort, one of the few skiers-only mountain resorts, is part of the Park City, Utah skiing metropolis, just 40 minutes from Salt Lake City © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

By Karen Rubin, Eric Leiberman & Sarah Falter

Travel Features Syndicate, goingplacesfarandnear.com

 

Park City is a veritable skiing metropolis so close to Salt Lake City (35-45 minutes drive), it may well be considered the suburbs rather than this vast Nature’s playground. Not only do you have Park City and Canyons (now combined under the Vail Resorts OneParkCity banner, making it the largest ski resort in the United States), but literally next door is Deer Valley Resort.

Deer Valley Resort is one of the only ski areas in the country that is skiers’-only (Alta, Utah is another). This makes for an old-school, European, retro atmosphere – dare we say dignified? sedate? quaint? As a skier, you don’t have that constant frantic feeling when you hear the looming scrapping sound building in intensity as snowboarders, tearing up the mountain, come upon you, like Jaws. You don’t have that hip, counter-culture vibe that tends to surround snowboarders. It is frankly more peaceful, calm, quiet.

Deer Valley has a deserved reputation of being ultra-luxurious – there are uniformed ski valets to help you with your equipment, parking lot shuttles, free overnight ski storage, groomed-to-perfection slopes, fine dining experiences in three day lodges, complimentary tours led by Mountain hosts and limited lift ticket sales so that the slopes are never crowded. It feels less like a resort and more like a country club.

It also offers luxurious on-mountain accommodations – indeed, it is the home of the world-famous, five-star Stein Ericksen Lodge which has held the title of  “World’s Best and United States’ Best Ski Hotel” as well as the St. Regis Hotel, a Starwoods hotel, which is accessed by its own funicular from the parking lot.

The five-star Stein Eriksen Lodge on the mountain at Deer Valley Resort has held the title of “World’s Best and United States’ Best Ski Hotel” © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Yet, to our eye when we visited during the last couple of week’s of the season, it seemed unpretentious. Or perhaps that is just because of the relaxed feeling that pervades.

Deer Valley affords 2,026 skiable acres over six mountains (about the size of Killington and Pico, Vermont, combined), six bowls, two chute areas. It offers a vertical rise of 3,000 feet to the highest summit, Empire, at 9570 ft. The longest run is 2.8 miles. There are 21 lifts including a high-speed gondola, 12 high speed quads, one fixed grip quad, five triples and two doubles.

Of Deer Valley’s 101 trails, 27% rated “easier”, 41% more difficult and 32% most difficult, making it ideal for families, new skiers and skiers of all abilities.

Deer Valley Resort offers loads of easy and intermediate terrain for skiers © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

It is a snowy, foggy, generally wet day when we visit, but that doesn’t interfere with the enjoyment. Here too, the mountain is so vast, first-timers to the resort need directions to get to the peak you want to ski if you are particular (I am still working out my confidence issues, especially when visibility is a factor). A mountain Ambassador helpfully maps out for us where we will find the peak with the best selection of intermediate trails to get me started. That’s Flagstaff Peak, where we head.

Eric has exchanged his snowboard for skis – skiing for the first time in years – and immediately leaves Sarah and me in the proverbial “dust.”

After a few runs, Eric and Sarah go off to the more challenging Empire Peak (summit at 9570 ft., highest among Deer Valley’s six peaks), with only blue and black trails from the summit.

Deer Valley Resort is a skiers-only paradise © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

The Empire lift offers some wonderful intermediate tree skiing (not very steep, trees are nicely spaced), so Sarah, who had never skied through glades before, gives it a try. She absolutely loves the experience — it’s so quiet and peaceful in the trees, and the snow tends to be the softest on the mountain. It really feels like it’s just you and the mountain.

I continue to get my rhythm on Flagstaff (summit at 9100 ft.) with a delectable selection of blue and green trails.

Fresh Dungeness crab tower, amazing appetizer at Royal Street Café at the Silver Lake Lodge at mid-mountain Deer Valley Resort, Utah, where we meet up for a lunch break © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

We meet for lunch at the Royal Street Café in the Silver Lake Lodge – a full-service restaurant with a lovely firepit in the middle, serving breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks and après ski from 11:30 am to 8 pm. The menu is delightful – creative American and international casual cuisine. Our waiter, Alex, makes some marvelous suggestions and we start off with Fresh Dungeness crab tower, made with fresh crab from Washington, avocado tomato crispy spiced wontons, and sauces is wasabi, soy and sweet chili. Sarah and Eric share a Maple Bacon BBQ Bison Burger, made from scratch and served with smoked habañero cheddar, sautéed onions, guacamole, barbeque sauce, habañero aioli, Tuscan bun and garlic-herb-parmesan shoestring fries; and grilled fresh ahi served with mango-avocado salsa, southwest slaw, smoked habañero mayonnaise, crisp corn tortilla shells or grilled fresh white corn tortillas (www.deervalley.com/Dining/wheretoeat/RoyalStreetCafe).

Eric and Sarah go off for even more challenging runs while I happily keep putting on the miles on the blue trails on Flagstaff Mountain.

Another option would be to take the Silver Lake Express to the Sterling Express quad up to the 9,400-foot summit of Bald Mountain. There, you have your choice of runs down the mountain or take the Wasatch and Sultan Express quads at the base back up to this beautiful peak. Intermediate and advanced skiers will enjoy Little Baldy Peak and the long run down Jordanelle, named for its sweeping views of Jordanelle Reservoir on the resort’s east face. Then, take the scenic gondola ride back up the mountain.

Riding the chairlift at Deer Valley Resort © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

You can follow in the tracks of the 2002 Olympians. Know You Don’t and Champion were sites for alpine slalom and freestyle mogul events. There’s no need to pick one or the other — just ride back up on the Carpenter Express. Champion is where local skier Shannon Barhke won silver in 2002, and it’s a favorite run for another local, 2010 mogul bronze medalist Byron Wilson. Deer Valley, like the other Park City-area resorts, also features the Nastar Ski Racing slalom experience.

Summer at Deer Valley

We are at Deer Valley in the closing days, but in mid-June, the mountain resort transforms for summer: pristine mountain biking trails, hiking, chairlift rides, al fresco dining, a children’s adventure program, and outdoor concerts at the Snow Park Outdoor Amphitheater featuring headlining musicians, world-renowned artists and local bands.

Deer Valley Resort, 2250 Deer Valley Drive South, Park City, UT 84060. Where to stay, what to do, packages and deals and other visitor planning tools are at www.deervalley.com, 800-424-3337, 435-649-1000.

Park City, Utah is arguably North America’s most accessible mountain recreation destination, just 35 minutes from Salt Lake City International Airport with convenient service. Park City offers over 100 lodging properties including bed and breakfast inns, condominiums and full-service hotels. Park City is home to Deer Valley Resort and Park City Mountain Resort and more than 400 miles of public trails offering year-round outdoor recreation. The area boasts 150 restaurants, stunning boutiques and galleries lining Historic Main Street, plus attractions such as the Utah Olympic Park.

For travel planning assistance, contact Park City Chamber of Commerce, Convention & Visitors Bureau, 1850 Sidewinder Drive #320, Park City, Utah, 800-453-1360, www.visitparkcity.com.

See also:

Park City Mountain, Utah: Biggest Ski Area in US is One of Easiest to Reach

See next:

Historic Park City, Utah Delights Diners, GalleryStrollers, FestivalGoers

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© 2017 Travel Features Syndicate, a division of Workstyles, Inc. All rights reserved. Visit goingplacesfarandnear.com www.huffingtonpost.com/author/karen-rubin , and travelwritersmagazine.com/TravelFeaturesSyndicate/. Blogging at goingplacesnearandfar.wordpress.com and moralcompasstravel.info. Send comments or questions to [email protected]. Tweet @TravelFeatures. ‘Like’ us at facebook.com/NewsPhotoFeatures

Paris Ray is winner of Gold Coast’s 5th Annual Your Big Break Talent Competition

The 6 finalists of the 5th annual Gold Coast Your Big Break talent competition: grand prize winner, Paris Ray (second from left) and runner up Julia Lambert (fourth from left)with Julia Hayden, Lydia von Hof, Sydney Perruzza and Jaclyn Manfredi © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

By Karen Rubin, Travel Features Syndicate, goingplacesfarandnear.com

Judges at the 5th annual final of the Gold Coast Acoustic Café’s Your Big Break talent competition had an unusually hard time picking the winners out of a talented field of six, but in the end, Paris Ray was the grand-prize winner and Julia Lambert the runner-up, at the Gold Coast Arts Center, Great Neck, Long Island, Saturday, April 1.

Paris Ray, a 21-year old from St. James who majored in  Studio Composition in the Conservatory of Music at college, dazzled the judges with her original song, “Astronomy” (“I became an astronaut so I could give you space.”) off her Just Visiting EP; a second, highly personal original song that gets to the heart of domestic violence, as well as the required George Michael song (each of the contestants only a week ago was assigned a George Michael song to perform).

Paris Ray was the grand prize winner of the 5th annual Gold Coast Your Big Break talent competition © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

Julia Lambert impressed with her song-stylings on the acoustical guitar, and her original song that soon will be released on an EP (“Take a chance, it will be okay, I promise.”).

Julia Lambert performing at the 5th annual Gold Coast Your Big Break talent competition © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

All of the performers were audience favorites:

Julia Hayden, from Port Washington, backed up with a sensational band, performed two original songs plus  a tribute to George Michael, which offered a MiddleEastern meets MidWest country feeling, and an really interesting song that featured the drum roll of a marching band (“Carry on”).

Julia Hayden performing at the 5th annual Gold Coast Your Big Break talent competition © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Lydia von Hof, just 15 years old but conveying a skill and sophistication way beyond her years (she is a classically trained pianist who will be performing Chopin at Carnegie Hall), brings a full, rich voice to her performance.

Lydia von Hof performing at the 5th annual Gold Coast Your Big Break talent competition © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Sydney Perruzza, from Carle Place, brought her bluesy style to her performance.

Sydney Perruzza performing at the 5th annual Gold Coast Your Big Break talent competition © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

Jaclyn Manfredi, 17, brings a sultry style reflecting jazz, blues and R&B influences, and has performed at the Apollo Theater. She performed an original song, “Warehouse.”

Jaclyn Manfredi performing at the 5th annual Gold Coast Your Big Break talent competition © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

The “Big Break” is not just a clever title. The young performers are competing for prizes that could well launch their career.

As the grand-prize winner of the 5th Annual Your Big Break talent competition, Ray  will have an opening spot for national acts at major venues like The Paramount, recording time at DCITY Studios and Online TV streaming opportunities, a feature on Reverbnation.com, a $250 gift certificate from All Music Inc. and ZOOM North America, a PR and social media campaign including management, booking and label services consultation with Rick Eberle Agency.

Lambert, as the runner up, won a video camera.

In addition, Rick Eberle has also invited all the contestants to appear on his radio and TV shows.

The judges are major players in the music industry including: ReverbNation.com’s Lou Plaia, All Music Inc.’s Guy Brogna, Songwriter Tara Eberle Drouin and Label Executives Stephen Marcuccio, Jerry Lembo, Linda Ingrisano, Mark Ambrosino.

Your Big Break Judges and Gold Coast Acoustic Café organizers are an elite group from the music industry © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

The contestants for Your Big Break were selected out of 1000 submissions through Gold Coast Arts Center (www.goldcoastarts.com) and Reverbnation.com sites in response to an open call for musicians age 15 to 25 who do not currently have a recording or publishing contract. The artists have to perform with a band or solo with an acoustic guitar or sing to a backing music track. There is no fee to submit.

Finals of the fifth annual Gold Coast Acoustic Café Your Big Break talent competition participants, organizers and judges at the Gold Coast Arts Center, Great Neck, Long Island © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

The six finalists came out of two semi-final competitions of performers and were paired with mentors to guide them in performing a song by George Michael, assigned to them, in tribute to the music icon who died last December: American Idol’s Robbie Rosen, Dream Recording Studio’s Jason Melker, Sojourn Record’s Mark Ambosino, arranger/producer/songwriter/remixer and former VP of A&R at Atlantic Records Jimmy Bralower, singer/songwriter John Hampson of Nine Days, and songwriter/producer Donnie Klang of MTV’s “Making the Band”.

Your Big Break talent competition is hosted by the Gold Coast Arts Center’s Acoustic Café and LoveRevolution.Org. Conceived by Rick Eberle and the Gold Coast Arts Center, the talent competition carries on the tradition of Long Island musical talent, including

Ashanti, Mariah Carey and LL Cool J (born on Long Island), Billy Joel, Lou Reed and Harry Chapin and going back to John Philip Sousa and Guy Lombardo.

The Como Brothers, the headliners of the evening, brought harmonies and flashback rock n’roll vibe that reminded you of the Everly Brothers © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

The Arts Center is transformed into the Gold Coast Acoustic Café once a month, a music venue that showcases local up-and-coming talent as well as established music acts. With its black box theater performance space and a lounge in the art gallery, the Gold Coast Acoustic Café is one of the few small music venues around which makes for a special and intimate atmosphere for artists and audience alike, especially during Your Big Break.

Gold Coast Arts Center, 113 Middle Neck Road, Great Neck NY. Call 516-829-2570, www.goldcoastarts.org.

See also:

Lambert, Manfredi Advance in Gold Coast Arts Center’s ‘Your Big Break’ Talent Competition 

Hayden, Ray, Van Hoff Advance in Gold Coast Arts Center’s ‘Your Big Break’ Talent Competition Finals, April 1

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© 2017 Travel Features Syndicate, a division of Workstyles, Inc. All rights reserved. Visit goingplacesfarandnear.com www.huffingtonpost.com/author/karen-rubin , and travelwritersmagazine.com/TravelFeaturesSyndicate/. Blogging at goingplacesnearandfar.wordpress.com and moralcompasstravel.info. Send comments or questions to [email protected]. Tweet @TravelFeatures. ‘Like’ us at facebook.com/NewsPhotoFeatures

Park City Mountain, Utah: Biggest Ski Area in US is One of Easiest to Reach

The intoxicating view at Park City Mountain, Utah, which after being combined with The Canyons, is now the biggest ski area in the US © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

By Karen Rubin, Eric Leiberman & Sarah Falter

Travel Features Syndicate, goingplacesfarandnear.com

I set out for Park City Mountain in Utah to see if it could really be true: you could leave your house on Long Island in the morning and be skiing the Rockies, or more precisely, the Wasatch Range, by noon.

The combination of great nonstop airline service into Salt Lake City and the remarkably close proximity of the international airport to Park City- just 35 minutes drive, literally as far from the airport as my house to JFK, the “suburbs” of the city – makes this all possible. Not to mention the choice of condo-style lodgings right at the Canyons base, the efficient ski rental process.

Sure enough, I was greeted at the airport and whisked away by Park City Transportation car service, checked into the Hyatt Centric Park City Hotel at Park City Mountain’s Canyons village base, picked up my pre-ordered skis through RentSkis.com (the fellow assisting me took the extra time to wax the skis to give me a better experience on the spring slush at the lower sections), used my Epic Pass, Vail Resort’s seasonal pass, which speeds you through the lift access with a point of a laser gun, and hopped the Red Pine Gondola to mid-mountain.

There I warmed up and got comfortable in my equipment on the couple of green runs, then found a gentle blue trail, Snow Dancer, off the Saddleback Express lift, to warm up my legs as I regaled in the view, and was happy as a clam.

Skiing down Snow Dancer © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

(There is a caveat, though: by skiing immediately and not taking time to acclimate, you can avoid altitude sickness by drinking lots of water beginning the day before and throughout the day, and avoiding alcohol the first day. If you do feel the effects of altitude sickness, take Tylenol and drink water and if necessary, come down to lower altitude.)

We Northeastern skiers will revel in actual snow, Park City’s legendary powder – even in spring conditions.  You don’t just ski Park City – which with Vail’s acquisition and unification with The Canyons is now the largest ski resort in the US – you explore it. It is so vast, it becomes a game for the first-time visitor to get from Canyons – where the trails tend to be tougher (only a couple of greens), but less crowded, more sun, and more snow – to Park City.

I only ski a couple of times a season so I am still tentative though I can handle just about any blue (intermediate) trail provided there is snow and not sheer ice (as we New England skiers are more familiar with). But I lack confidence.

Lesson on Snow Dancer, on the Canyons, with Alex Fleet © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Joined by Eric and Sarah who arrive late Thursday from San Francisco, Sarah and I spend our first morning together taking a half-day private lesson with Alex Fleet, one of the top instructors at Park City with nearly two decades of experience who is originally from Great Britain (you pay one price for up to 6 people).

Lessons are not just for beginners and certainly not just for kids. Skiing is a skill that you acquire in layers (and with practice). A lesson helps you acquire the proper form and technique so you can handle any terrain. But the most important ingredient is feeling relaxed and confident so you get a better flow and can use your proper technique.

Our goal is to feel comfortable when challenged, and for me, not to be so skittish at taking on new trails, but to have the confidence that I could do it.

Secondly, I want to see how to get over from Canyons to Park City (there are no green trails to get you there – it is a series of blues or blacks to a half-dozen lifts). I had been told the “trip” could take as much as two hours from Canyons to Park City (about 45 minutes to get back). So Alex, starting us on the green trail (stopping to take in the incredible view) to check us out, progresses swiftly to Snow Dancer (a stunning blue), and then moves us over, peak by peak, to Park City.

View from the Quicksilver Gondola headed from Canyons to Park City © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.comThe lifts themselves – especially the specially constructed 8 passenger Quicksilver Gondola that connected Park City and Canyons when Vail merged the two in 2015 – are like themepark rides –  exciting trips that give you sensational views of spectacular scenery as you travel up and over the canyons that separate the peaks.

Alex gets us over to the Park City area (about one-third the size of the Canyons) in much less time than the two hours, where we find a blue heaven, and where there is vastly more green terrain (the longest trail is 3.5 miles), not to mention the blacks and the glades (we can look forward to that another time). He takes us around a few of the peaks on blue trails before starting back to the Canyons, enough to get a feel for Park City. Throughout, Alex is refining our technique – weighting skis, turning, edging – and building confidence for the climatic challenge: Sidewinder.

He takes us back to the Canyons side, finishing our lesson off the Tombstone lift on Sidewinder (Alex says the popular name is “Slidewinder”), a double-blue square trail, where I take note of an actual sign that warns off all but advanced skiers. Alex says he knows we can do it, “Just follow me!” (and don’t look down because it basically goes straight down without flattening out.)

Sarah fulfills her wish for lesson to be challenged: she tackles the double-blue Sidewinder trail © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

Alex has made sure to take us here at the best possible condition of the day – not icy or fast in the morning, nor too slushy in the afternoon’s spring heat (the temperature has gone as high as 60 degrees during our stay). Conditions are just right as the noon hour approaches.

It is the confidence builder we have asked Alex for at the start (Sarah had said she wanted to feel challenged), because if you can do the toughest blue on the mountain, you feel you can do anything (assuming the conditions are decent).

While we are at our lesson, Eric, who is an advanced snowboarder, has been tearing up the slopes.

Hiking up to Ninety Nine 90 © 2017 Eric Leiberman/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

Eric takes the Ninety Nine 90 chairlift, hiking 10 minutes to an “out-of-bounds” bowl, “where there were endless spots to drop in from to have your own fresh lines; then you go from the steep fresh powder bowl to glades and moguls; a beautiful 10-minute trail, even for the speediest of skiers, made the 10-minute hike at the top of the lift well worth it.” (By midday when we meet up at the bottom of the Tombstone lift, his Epic Pass, the seasonal pass to Vail Resorts which is also plugged into tracking where you’ve been and your accumulated altitude, showed he had already done 17,000 ft of elevation.)

Armed with my confidence, on my last full day at Park City, I set out to get from Canyons to Park City on my own, which necessitates handling new trails each time. I start out at Guest Services and ask the kindly attendant to recommend an itinerary, so I don’t have to think about which blues to take. Based on the map of what has been groomed, she uses a yellow marker to map my day. And what a day!

Indeed, when Vail Resorts acquired Park City Mountain Resort and then Canyons Resort, combining them in the summer of 2015, it created the largest single ski and snowboard resort in the United States. Vail immediately invested $50 million, building a spectacular new 8 passenger Quicksilver Gondola to connect the two areas (breathtaking ride!), along with the new King Con Express six-pack and Motherlode Express Quad among the improvements. The combined One Park City offers more than 7,300 acres of skiable terrain, more than 300 trails (and they don’t count tiny spurs as named trails like they do in New England), 41 lifts, 8 terrain parks, one super pipe and one mini pipe.

The new Miners Camp at the base of Quicksilver Gondola and Silverlode lift provides respite © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

We’re talking 17 mountain peaks! 14 bowls! A vertical of 3200 feet from the base at 6,800 feet to the summit at 10,000 feet! And even though it is just two weeks before the mid-April close of the season, and the springtime temperatures have soared, Park City averages 370 inches of snow a year, so still has an amazing base of actual snow to ski on.  (This makes for a wonderful incentive for people to come out for the these last days of the season, to apply the day’s lift ticket to the cost of a discounted Epic Pass for next season that much more valuable; indeed, a woman from St. Louis said she bought next year’s Epic Local Pass, which is expected to also include Stowe Mountain Vermont, for just over $500.)

It’s a “blue-bird” day – when the sun is brilliant and the sky the deep blue color of a blue bird’s belly. It is just perfection.

I take my time, and have a thrilling experience really exploring and discovering the mountain, enjoying my skiing and literally accumulating the mileage which is the only way to really bump up your skills. Skiing with confidence is key because when you are tense, your muscles tense, you don’t get that nice flow and balance and you use more energy than necessary.

Riding the chairlift at Park City © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

The scenery is intoxicating – not just the sparkling pure air and the altitude that gets your heart racing, but the stunning glades of Aspen trees, pine trees sprinkled in, the peaks and canyons, and the perspective, as well as the ride the chairlifts give you.

It takes me 2 hours (savoring the stunning scenery, stopping for photos, checking the map and enjoying making turns) and I get to the Park City side. I take the SilverLode Express to the top, do Parley’s Park trail, and after a chat on the lift with a Park City regular, go back up for a run on Assessment before starting back to the Canyons.

Aspens like sentries on the Saddleback Express chairlift © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

Everyone we meet – and during the course of the day, I meet people from all over the country – and especially the Ambassadors and lift operators – are incredibly nice. When I seem a little confused about how to get to the Timberline lift, a woman from St. Louis I meet on the gondola waits for me where the trails split, to make sure I take the right trail.

I make my way back to Tombstone, and take the Red Pine Road trail back to the mid-mountain base, but I am feeling so good, I pass up going back down on the Red Pine Gondola, and ski down Boomer to the Canyons base (the big issue was the amount of slushy snow because of the warm conditions), feeling very satisfied with myself for being adventurous. I achieved my goal: skiing new trails.

The Park City Mountain trail map, with my day’s route in yellow marker.

Unfortunately, we didn’t get to take in one of the experiences that are unique to Park City skiing: the Historic Mountain Tour. You need to be intermediate or above to take this free, two-hour skiing adventure to the various mining shafts from Park City’s silver days.

The Historic Mountain tours depart daily from the Park City resort base area by the Eagle Statue at 10 am and again at the Trail Map near the top of Bonanza lift at 1 pm. During the course of the tour, you get to appreciate how the mountain developed from a mining camp in the 1880s to an internationally recognized winter sports destination. The guides relate the stories behind the authentic structures you see on the mountain (there are some 1,200 miles of tunnels that wind through the mountains and you get to see some of the mine shafts), how Park City emerged as a ski jump arena, its World Cup Racing heritage and how it came to international prominence with the 2002 Winter Olympic Games. You get to experience some of the same runs that the Olympians did and ski or ride past some of Park City’s historic mining buildings with an expert tour guide. We have it on the list for our return visit.

Sign at Ninety Nine 90 © 2017 Eric Leiberman/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

Park City Mountain’s trails are wonderfully carved, superbly maintained and groomed (500 acres of the 7300 have snowmaking) – unless the appeal are the trails and glades that they are not. I appreciate the great signage (otherwise, you could easily get lost or waste time constantly opening up the humongous map).

(Eric saw the best sign, on Nine-Nine 90, named for the elevation of the peak, 9990 ft.: “You are Leaving the Ski Resort. You Can Die. This is Your Decision” with skull and bones to emphasize the point.)

Sure enough, I was able to ski a full day on the last day – leaving the Hyatt Centric Park City Hotel at 9:30 pm for the 11:50 pm Delta nonstop flight back to JFK.

So, my four-days in Park City afforded four full days of skiing. Mission accomplished.

Hyatt Centric Park City is ski in/ski out at the Canyons base of Park City Mountain © 2017 Karen Rubin/goingplacesfarandnear.com

Hyatt Centric Park City

The Hyatt Centric Park City at the Canyons base, which has been a superb lodging for our stay and has its  own lift for ski in/out convenience, and is just a five-minute walk to the shops and restaurants, let us use the outdoor heated pool, hot tubs, sauna and lockers after we were checked out. Our two-bedroom condo (the hotel has 27 two-bedroom suites, which can be turned into 3 bedroom suites, and 15 one-bedroom suites) is unbelievably spacious, outfitted with every possible amenity including a full-kitchen, a dining table that seats eight, three TVs, a Jacuzzi bathtub in the master bedroom, four balconies, windows everywhere there open up to the gorgeous outdoors, and washer/dryer (so convenient when you ski).

It also offers a free nighttime shuttle into historic Park City (on the hour from 5 pm; last one returning at 10:30 pm), and on my last evening, instead of waiting in the lobby, I hopped a ride for a final visit, stopping in at more of the gorgeous galleries that line Main Street. I returned with plenty of time to relax in the Hyatt Centric lounge before the car service picked me up to get to the airport.

Park City is very much a year-round adventure destination, and the Hyatt Centric also offers an in-house activities company, Wasatch Adventure Guides, offering fly fishing, heli skiing, hiking (Hyatt Centric Park City, 3551 North Escala Court, Park City, Utah, USA, 84098, 435 940 1234, parkcity.centric.hyatt.com).

So Much More to Do at Park City Mountain

 We were so enthralled with skiing, we didn’t have time to take in the many other adventures and experiences of the area. But there is plenty to do, especially for regulars:

Alpine Coaster: Climb into toboggan-style cars for a special way of experiencing the magnificent Wasatch mountain scenery. The automated lift system whisks you to the top of the track and you fly down the mountain on nearly 4,000 feet of curves, bends and loops. It is one of the longest slides in the world.

Guided Snowshoe Tours: Park City offers a network of snowshoe trails hidden among the spectacular skiing. Guided tours are created with a unique destination, experience or adventure in mind.

Horse Drawn Sleigh Rides: Snuggle in for a scenic 30-minute horse drawn sleigh ride through Willow Draw showcasing a night-time winter wonderland after the lifts have closed.

Additional winter experiences include Dog Sledding, Snowmobile Tours and Cross Country Ski Tours.

Also, the Utah Olympic Park where you can take a guided tour, take a thrilling ride on the Winter Comet Bobsled on the Olympic track, experiencing 3+ Gs and hitting speeds of 60 mph (open year round); the Extreme Zipline replicates flying off the K120 Nordic ski jump, propelling you to up to 50 mph. There’s also an adventure course, scenic chairlifts, and the George Eccles 2002 Olympic Games Museum (look for Great Neck’s own figure skating gold medalist Sarah Hughes). Still a year-round US Olympic training site, you also get to watch athletes of all ages training for Nordic Ski Jumping (in summer, they jump into a pool), Freestyle skiing, bobsled, skeleton and luge. (Open year-round, free admission to the park, www.uolf.com).

Park City’s historic Main Street. The Hyatt Centric provides a free shuttle into the town each evening © 2017 Karen Rubin/ goingplacesfarandnear.com

But we have time each day to enjoy discovering historic Park City, with its astonishingly fine galleries and shops and fine-dining venues (more to come).

Park City Mountain (www.parkcitymountain.com) is part of Vail Resorts, Inc., which through its subsidiaries, is a leading global mountain resort operator of 10 world-class mountain resorts and three urban ski areas, which in addition to Park City in Utah includes Vail, Beaver Creek, Breckenridge and Keystone in Colorado; Heavenly, Northstar and Kirkwood in the Lake Tahoe area of California and Nevada; Perisher in Australia; Whistler Blackcomb in Canada; Afton Alps in Minnesota, Mt. Brighton in Michigan and Wilmot Mountain in Wisconsin. Vail Resorts also owns and/or manages a collection of casually elegant hotels under the RockResorts brand, as well as the Grand Teton Lodge Company in Jackson Hole, Wyo.

The big news is that Vail is in the process of purchasing its first New England resort, Stowe Mountain, Vermont (see story), which it is expected will be included on 2017-18 Epic Pass (epicpass.com). For more information on all the resorts, visit www.snow.com.

(See: Vail Resorts Plans to Add Stowe Vermont to 2017-18 Epic Pass Giving Northeastern Skiers New Reason to Buy

Plan a visit to Park City, Park City Chamber of Commerce, Convention & Visitors Bureau, 1850 Sidewinder Drive #320, Park City, Utah, 800-453-1360, www.visitparkcity.com.

Next: Skiers Only at Deer Valley

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