Skiing The Canyons yesterday completed my Park City Trifecta, and convinced me that this area of Utah can make a powerful claim to be America's schussing capital. Combined with Park City Mountain Resort and Deer Valley, skiers have almost 8,000 acres of terrain, on nearly 20 peaks served by about 60 lifts.

Two Park City resorts were Olympic sites in 2002, plus it's the headquarters of the U.S. Ski Team and home to many skiing companies.

And the three big ski resorts are close together. Park City and Deer Valley abut -- but there's no crossover trail and no common ticketing arrangement. Both can be seen from The Canyons.

The Canyons is Park City's newest major ski resort, developed shortly before the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympic Winter Games. The Flight of the Canyons -- a fancy name for its eight-person gondola -- whisks skiers out of the village (background) and up to a central mid-mountain area.
SCOTT ANDREWS PHOTO

The Canyons is the region's newest major ski resort, a vast expansion and multi-million dollar makeover of the former Wolf Mountain. Creating The Canyons was one of the last projects of the former American Skiing Company.

A skier checks the trail map at the top of the Saddleback Express, one of 13 chairlifts at The Canyons. He's got plenty to choose from -- about 3,700 acres, the most in Utah.
SCOTT ANDREWS PHOTO

The Canyons boasts 3,700 skiable acres -- tops in Utah, they claim -- on eight mountains of about 9,000 feet elevation. These range from fairly easy areas such as Dream Peak to Ninety-Nine Ninety, which is entirely black diamond and double-black.

Skiers prepare to head down a long green trail from the top of The Canyons' Dream Peak.
SCOTT ANDREWS PHOTO

I found that getting around was rather awkward, in part due to The Canyons' extreme size. Two lift rides are required to reach the spot where most skiers start. (First) a cabriolet transports people from the parking lot to the village, where they then have to walk a couple hundred feet before (second) riding the Flight of the Canyons -- the fancy name they use for their gondola -- which then transports them to the Red Pine Lodge area, a sort of central mid-mountain staging area. Then they start skiing.

E-mail this entry to a friend