The Hills are Alive With the Scent of Whiskey

The Hills are Alive With the Scent of Whiskey

Cody Kirkland
Places, Travel, Stories, Drinks, Events

You're already in Park City so you might as well go to High West's big new fairytale distillery just up the highway in Wanship. the High West Saloon in Park City is probably too crowded anyway.

My first venture to High West Distillery was memorable, even though I made it no where near a shot of whiskey. After a night of heavy snowfall during the Sundance Film Festival, the private road leading to the distilling facility at Blue Star Ranch in Wanship was impassable. These things occasionally happen in this high-mountain, semi-rural landscape ... 

tfw u need 2 get away from the mob of Sundancers

tfw u need 2 get away from the mob of Sundancers

Cody Kirkland
Travel, Stories, Places

I don't know about you, but I easily get sick of the hordes of idiots in puffy coats. I decided to try skiing:

Nobody in my group believes me when I tell them this is the first time I’ve ever touched a ski. I grew up in Utah but my family didn’t ski, and when I graduated from sledding I went straight to a snowboard. I tell the cross-country ski instructor that I’ve been here to Soldier Hollow before, though. I came to help my uncle Steve install some gigantic Olympic rings for the 2002 Winter Olympic Games when I was 16. (Soldier Hollow hosted the biathlon and cross-country ski events.)

The ski instructor, whose last name is actually Winter, points to some spandex-clad skiers gliding past us as we step into our skis. “Those are Olympians right there!”

Great, now I get to learn to ski in front of Olympic skiers ... 

Sundance, Full Circle

Sundance, Full Circle

Cody Kirkland
Events, Travel, Stories, Places

It’s time for another Sundance Film Festival and, thanks to me, there is a wildly entertaining “how to have a good time in between screenings” narrative-style guide to the festival in SLC and Park City. I wrote about drinking a $30 Manhattan, flying through space in a VR world, valeting my p.o.s. Ford Focus at the Waldorf Astoria, ordering the entire menu at HSL, getting cheese-drunk at Caputo’s, and more. It came out in the Utah Explorer’s Guide in circulation with the Salt Lake Tribune in December, and it's online below. Plus, included in the story are links to a couple bonus features: Touring High West's fairytale distillery and getting snow-blind while skiing for the first time ever. Happy Sundancing!