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Left Syracuse at about 5 pm for Salt Lake City, Utah! Arrived in Utah at 11:00 pm. Tom's Godparents picked us up at the airport and brought us back to their house in Draper where we would stay for the week.

We woke to partly sunny skies and relatively mild temperatures in the valley. The drive up Little Cottonwood Canyon to Snowbird took only about 15 minutes since Draper is located near the mouth of the canyon.

I could already feel the altitude affecting me at the base of Snowbird (8,100 feet above sea level). At 11,000 feet, the altitude's affect was only more pronounced. Throughout the day I felt dizzy at times; nauseous at others, but I kept skiing. I didn't expect the altitude to affect me like it did, but the first day would be the only day the altitude would be an issue.

We started by loading onto the tram after quite a long wait. Our first run was off of the "Road to Provo" traverse atop Little Cloud Bowl. We went about halfway down the traverse and then dropped into the bowl. The snow was slightly wind-scorn, but nice and soft and dry. The pitch was moderate, but definitely the steepest intermediate terrain I had ever skied.

We hammered away at the Little Cloud Lift for most of the morning until we ventured to Mineral Basin. We followed "Path to Paradise" around the Western bowl to the end, then dropped in to the heavily skied packed powder. After a few runs in Mineral Basin, including one down a ridiculously steep slope right past the Little Cloud lift and through a narrow chute, we headed back for the front-side.

On one of our runs, we ended up in a most precarious position. After heading through a double-black-diamond gate and past an avalanche control warning sign, we ended up atop a near vertical pitch with nowhere to go except down. After more than a half-hour of carefully negotiating down the ridiculously steep off-trail pitch (in full view of the GadZoom Express Quad), we finally reached more flat ground. After a few more runs, with my nerves shot and my body aching, we stopped for a much needed rest at the Mid-Gad restaurant.

We finished our day at Snowbird on the Peruvian side by hammering away at the bumps on Lower Primrose Path, and with one final run from the summit down several different trails including parts of the following: Primrose Path, Chip's Run, and Who Dunnit.

Went to Alta Ski Area on this day. We parked in the Albion Basin lot. Partly cloudy skies throughout the day with the sun peeking through at times. Headed over to Germania. Skied the trails under Germania all morning with one ride up the Wildcat lift and a run down Stimulation for a little variety. We then went back to Germania.

One of the most fun runs was down Sunspot and then across to the Germania liftline. Unfortunately, the second time we skied that line, I hooked my right ski in a mogul trough where it subsequently stayed. I went down with one ski and started sliding headfirst down the slope and across the trail. I could not stop sliding. I tried to dig my pole in, but that with my poles' straps, I could only dig the know of the handle into the snow, and that didn't work at all. By now I was sliding straight down the trail right underneath the Germania lift. Finally, I was able to swing myself around so I had a downhill ski to dig in to stop my slide. I stopped only about 6 feet from a tree. That experience was definitely one of the scariest of my life! On the remainder of the run, we came upon a man laid out flat underneath the Germania chair. His friends tended to him, and were talking to him. It appeared that he may have run into a tree. He did not look well, but he was conscious, I believe. On the lift ride up, however, they were giving him CPR and ski patrol was skiing very quickly down to him. We took lunch after seeing that, especially after my own dangerous fall. I hope he was OK, but we never did find out how he was.

Anyway, the afternoon turned out to be much better. The sun came out more frequently and we stayed off the bumped runs underneath Germania. We headed to the Supreme lift from Sugarloaf to check out the conditions over there, but were thoroughly unimpressed. Instead, we found Ballroom to Main Street to be a fun run, especially since there were two huge kickers on the run. So, for the rest of the afternoon, we skied the still-fresh soft snow on Ballroom, launched off the jumps at the top of Main Street (I landed a 180, and fell hard on two 360 attempts), and ripped the remaining groomed trail to the base of Germania. I had a great time at Alta, even though we skied much less than half of the mountain.

We decided to check out Snowbasin Resort on this day. We'd heard good things from those who've skied it, and, of course, the Olympic downhill was held there last year, so we figured it would be nice. Well, it was nice, but the skiing wasn't so great.

The lodge at Snowbasin is absolutely awesome. If I had to describe a ski lodge, my description would closely match the lodge at Snowbasin. With that said, I don't really care about the lodge because I'm there to ski. Unfortunately, with Snowbasin's low elevation (it's highest lift reaches only about as high as 500 feet above Alta's base elevation) and the warm temperatures, the snow was just slush. That normally doesn't bother me, I'm usually game for some nice spring corn snow, but I didn't come to Utah for that! We tried to get our money back, but that obviously didn't work, so we tried to make the best of a slightly disappointing situation.

So, we headed up Allen Peak to do the Olympic Downhill run. The top was loaded with Caravan sized slush bumps--definitely not fun. The rest of the run was just like the rest of the mountain--corn snow conditions. The downhill run was actually quite nice as it twisted down the mountain through a series of huge man-made bowls.

We realized, however, that going off-trail was only frustrating as the mounds of slush simply made skiing hard and slow, so we stayed on trail for the remainder of the day. We just ripped up and down the Needles Gondola the rest of the day.

After skiing we visited the Gateway outdoor mall in Salt Lake City, which was nice, especially since the temperatures were in the high 60s.

This day would be our only off day from skiing. We couldn't go to Las Vegas (for various reasons), so we went to Park City instead. Thursday was the warmest day, so far. Temperatures reached almost 75 in the valley. In Park City, the temperatures were cooler, but 55 degrees isn't exactly cold! The town and all the Park City resorts were virtually empty.

We just walked up and down Main Street while we were there. We checked out all the shops. Unfortunately, each shop carries the same souvenirs, the same postcards, etc. Besides the beer we had at the Wasatch Brew Pub while we watched the first Big East Tournament game, and besides the awesome Rossignol jacket I found at one of the first ski shops we visited, Park City was BORING.

In the early afternoon we headed back in to Salt Lake City. We stopped for lunch at a Sonic at 10225 State Street. Consequently, Elizabeth Smart, the Salt Lake City 15-year-old missing since June of 2002, was found at 10200 State Street right before we ate lunch!

And that was pretty much it for our much needed off-day.

After carefully considering Brighton as our next ski destination, we ultimately decided to take the safe bet and explore Snowbird again.

The skies were absolutely clear, and the temperatures were warm, but not quite as warm as the previous day. While the lower mountain was well above freezing, the upper mountain was getting there, but wasn't quite there yet. Regulator Johnson was still frosted over from the previous night.

We found the best snow was all the way down the other side of Road To Provo and down a chute to the left of our line down from Road To Provo. We took several runs following that line, then dropped down Mineral Basin.

Mineral Basin was very nice, but a little too slushy at spots. We took some runs off the Baldy Express Quad, which were generally easy runs, but there were some nice jumps, too. Then we followed the Bookends Traverse all the way around the Western Bowl below the American Fork Twin Peaks. The snow there was remarkably better since it was protected from the sun. After a few more runs in Mineral Basin, we headed to the Mid-Gad restaurant for a rest.

We then did what we did the other day, we headed over to the Peruvian side of the mountain via the Bass Highway for the afternoon. We took a few runs down Primrose Path then jumped on the tram. Surprisingly, the snow on the Peruvian side of the mountain in the upper altitudes was perfect. I wished we had skied there more during the day. I entertained some thoughts of dropping in off the cirque down Primrose Path, but I just wasn't up for it, so we continued down Chip's until we found a suitable spot to drop in. This section of the run was awesome because I skied it well and the snow was awesome. We then completed the run by following Chip's, Primrose Path, and Chip's Face all the way to the bottom. I wanted to take another run from the top, but Tom didn't, so we left. Another fine day at Snowbird was finished, and I left PLENTY of stuff to do on my next visit.

Our final day of skiing since we would be leaving at 11:59 on March 14, 2003. We decided to return to Alta for our final ski day. It was overcast and colder in the valley as we headed up Little Cottonwood Canyon. It began snowing as we pulled into Alta's parking lot, and it only started to snow even harder as we put on our ski gear. By the time we made it to the top of the Sunnyside lift, it was a complete white-out. Welcome to Alta!

Our first real run was down a line in the Ballroom. I couldn't see a thing, and there wasn't enough snow yet to cover up the poor conditions created by the warmth of the previous day. Regardless, we kept skiing. The snow was really falling hard, and it began to accumulate. Each run became softer and softer.

Unfortunately, Tom was not prepared for the massive accumulation. I put my lining into my jacket, so I was actually quite warm since temperatures were barely below freezing. Tom, however, wore only his fleece lining and a t-shirt underneath. He was cold, so we went to Alf's Restaurant for lunch. Tom's hands were freezing and he was shivering throughout lunch. He had no other clothes with him either, so I decided that we would have to leave. He offered to wait in the lodge while I took some runs, but that's no fun, so after lunch we skied down to the lodge, bought some souvenirs at the ski shop and drove back to the valley.

Remember the windshield crack? Well, the second the temperature outside dropped to 31 as we drove back to the valley, the windshield began cracking horizontally and vertically. All told, the temperature dipped below freezing for only five minutes, but the damage was done and there was no chance for a simple patch.

After dinner we watched Syracuse lose to Connecticut in the Big East Tournament semifinal, and then headed to the airport for our midnight departure.

At 6:00 a.m. we arrived at JFK airport. Our three hour layover was quite taxing. Finally, at 9:45, our flight left and we arrived in Syracuse a short time later. I arrived at my dorm to find that the power was off and that I would have to lug my three HEAVY bags up ten floors. That was not fun.

And that's all for my Spring Break trip to Utah! It was very fun, and it was great to finally experience some big mountain skiing out west.