On March 4th, Desiree and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary. We celebrated by renewing our vows and returning to our original honeymoon spot, Park City, Utah. We renewed our vows in the 
small chapel adjacent to the sanctuary of our church, First Presbyterian of Maitland. We had a 
small service and invited the original wedding party. Original automobile artwork courtesy of the unknown artists. Caralyn loved the artwork and didn't understand why the work had to be removed! After the service, we all went to Steak and Ale for dinner. Click on the small pictures for a full image. Click here to see the index of all the pictures.
That evening, Desiree and I packed up Caralyn and Lindsey to stay with Desiree's sister, Nancy Allen. Desiree's parents, Gus and Bea also took turns watching the girls during the honeymoon. We are both so grateful to Gus, Bea, Nancy, Bill, and Angela for making it possible for us to have this dream vacation. Since we figured this was the only opportunity for a vacation for two in the next few years, we decided to go first class!
The next morning we flew out to Salt Lake City
to start the festivities. Since parking is tough in Park City and we didn't want to have to drive, we lined up a limousine ride from the airport to Park City. The limo was great, very smooth and we got to Park City pronto.
We stayed at the Gables Hotel in the Park City Mountain Resort. The hotel is at the base of the Payday lift in the Resort pavilion. The pavilion has several hotels, restaurants, ski-rental shops and an ice skating rink. We were
only a few yards from the slopes and the Gables had all the amenities on the first floor, a ski rental, coffee shop and photography studio. Our suite had two fireplaces and a great patio with a view of the pavilion and the slopes. Utah allows wood burning fireplaces, so I sharpened my primeval fire starting skills to keep Desiree warm. Although, I have to admit that I doubt that my ancestors were able to use fat sticks and matches!
Park City is similar to Breckenridge in that it is an old mining town converted into a vacation destination, except Park City is slightly larger. That evening we went down to Main Street to see the sights and attend a play. We saw Neil Simon's Prisoner of Second Avenue at the Egyptian Theatre on Main Street.
The next day we hit the slopes. Park City is very large and we were pretty rusty on skis. We rented some of the new parabolic skis, which I think allowed us plenty of latitude. The new skis are much easier to turn so you can carve the turns rather than skidding on the turns. We didn't fall once the entire trip, although I, at least, deserved to fall a few times. We were looking
forward to "ski apres". I brought my wine boda filled with Rumple Minze peppermint schnapps to
keep us warm. We kept the wine boda close the whole trip. We also had a jacuzzi tub with steam room in the suite, so apres was great! Also the Moguls Coffee Café on the first floor had a great Mangy Moose. A Mangy Moose is a cappuccino, except the milk is chocolate milk and they throw in a scoop of chocolate mousse.
On Sunday we tried to go ballooning, but the weather wasn't clear enough. The balloonist only goes early in the morning and it needs to be clear and not too windy. But in the afternoon, we went into Salt Lake City to see the Utah Jazz play the Los Angeles Lakers. We also saw the Jazz play on our original honeymoon. We had great seats, third row courtside right behind the announcers. Boy, is Bob Costas short, check out the two seat cushions in the picture. Although the Jazz lost, it was a close game and it was great being that close to the action. Seeing Malone, Stockton, Shaq and Rodman in action was pretty exciting.
Monday, we were back on the slopes. This time we were determined to get to farther back on the mountains to the mountain top lodge. We knew we were done for the day when we got to the run named "Parley's Park". The run was a blue, but it seemed like a blue-black to us. We didn't look too good, we just managed to get down without falling, more of an organized fall down the run rather than some professional skiing.
That night, we went to town for dinner at 350 Main Street - Seafood and Oyster Co. We look pretty wiped out at the table. The place was very nice, great mixed greens salad, I didn't recognize all the greens. They may have sneaked in a dandelion green! The place had the best chipote baby back ribs I've had in a while, and Desiree had the New York Strip. Desiree even ate some cilantro by mistake!
Tuesday morning, we again tried to go ballooning, but the weather conspired against us again. It 
seems we were destined to either ski or balloon, and we chose skiing. While packing to leave, we saw a mother and a 3-year-old playing in the snow outside the Gables. The child had a great stegosaurus hat on that I'm sure Craig Hughes will buy soon! The boy made us homesick for the girls so we were glad to get back to Orlando and see them.