Day 20 Snowbird - The bird is the word

Another down day today. Slept in until 9:00am. Had a surprisingly good sleep given the Airport Inn is one of the noisiest hotels I've ever stayed in. Being located right next to SLC International Airport there were planes coming and going all night.
Breakfasted at the hotel and caught the hotel shuttle back to the airport to catch the Alta Shuttle to Snowbird...comprendez?

The ride out of town was unique. It's not every day you find yourself bombing along a six lane freeway in the outer suburbs of a major city with towering mountain ranges on three sides.
The conversation of my fellow shuttleites was a little on the gloomy side...much more snow in previous years, the snow should be thick on the ground in the valley this time of year, global warming etc.
It was a beautiful and warm day. A great day to be taking a ride into the mountains.

Snowbird is only 26 miles from down town SLC, so it only took 40 odd minutes to get there. Unlike Telluride where once we left the plains and hit the snow we seemed to drive for miles before reaching the resort, with Snowbird it's a sudden steep climb just before the resort, so one minute there's very little snow and the next minute you're surrounded by it.

Snowbird is another fascinating place and entirely different from all the other resorts we've visited. It comprises two distinct ski areas (Snowbird and Alta) that are interconnected but that don't share the same lift pass. If I wish to ski across to Alta I have to pay a $32 upgrade on my lift pass.
The resorts are owned and operated by two different companies.

Snowbird from my balcony

When approaching from SLC you hit Snowbird first, Alta is only another 500m up the road. For all intents and purposes they appear to be the one resort.
The Bird is a purpose build resort. There is no town as such. There are resort complexes sprinkled along the extremely narrow valley floor.  I'm staying in a complex called The Inn. It's a seven story apartment building equipped with a gym and outdoor heated pool, and hot tubs. The Snowbird base area complex is situated a short walk from the Inn.
The Snowbird Centre is a multi story building that contains several restaurants, ski shops, resort offices, the aerial tram (yes SB has an aerial tram), and a decent sized supermarket.
The Snowbird company owns and operates everything. I was given a guest card which allows me to book up all my purchases to my room. But I keep forgetting to use it and so far have been paying with my credit card.

The Bird from inside my apartment

The Bird is the word

The whole operation is really slick. I popped into the supermarket to get some breakfast supplies, and the nice young checkout girl asked me if I would like her to call a shuttle to take me back to my apartment. I said thanks but I think I can manage the 5 minute walk with my groceries. Basically they've got shuttles on demand for guests.

And now to my apartment. It's awesome. I'm on the 3rd floor but I took the elevator down from reception. There's a massive balcony that opens out onto the panoramic mountain vista. It's got a well equipped kitchen, fire place, powder room...that's right powder room, and a wall bed. I have to pull the wall bed out, it doesn't have a remote, but you can't have everything I guess.

The weather was very warm today, and it got quite windy in the afternoon. That warm norwester type wind, so I expect the snow will be spring conditions down low tomorrow. The plan is to hit the tram early-ish...I haven't ridden a tram since Kitzbuhel in 1984, so that's gonna be another little piece of novelty.

That's the other side of the valley behind me

Looking towards Snowbird from the same place as above. See how narrow the valley is.

Mason called to have a chat and tell me their flight out of Denver had been cancelled so they're overnighting in Denver.