See Salt Lake with a Connect Pass
With all the great places to see in Utah — even just in the Salt Lake Valley — there are bound to be a few tourist attractions that even locals haven’t visited yet. We’ve all said at some time or another, “I’ve always meant to go there, but … “
Enter the Connect Pass. The Salt Lake Visitors Bureau has put together a one-, two- or three-day pass that provides entry to 13 different venues. On a Tuesday afternoon, we gathered up the kids and set out for our Connect Pass adventure.
We started at Discovery Gateway, the children’s museum located in The Gateway shopping center in downtown Salt Lake City. All of our group fell into that category of always meaning to go, but never having done so. The ticket agent scanned our passes and gave us wristbands, and off we went.
An information booth had maps and membership flyers. With two floors of hands-on exhibits, the map was helpful in making sure we didn’t miss anything. Formerly The Children’s Museum of Utah, Discover Gateway encourages exploration and creativity involving various careers and areas of the community. It’s a smorgasbord of stimulation and is bound to have something for any child’s interest. On the day of our visit, it was quite busy, but we found that most kids were willing to take turns.
The first floor was great for the little ones. Caleb, 18 months, had a great time climbing on blocks, riding scooters and sitting in cars and trucks in the Utah Farm area and the gas station. While Daxon, 14, wasn’t too interested in the museum, he proved helpful in keeping track of the little ones among the swarm of kids there that day.
The little girls, Grace and Ella, both 3, had a great time loading up shopping baskets full of food at the grocery store and then handing them over to Jaggyr, 5, who manned the cash register. But perhaps the girls’ favorite was fixing dinner in the play house, complete with refrigerator, sink, oven and oven mitts, and cupboards full of dishes.
The boys spent time in the construction zone, operating cranes that hoist foam blocks in a sort of hammock. Kazen, 10, moved myriad blocks around, and even tried to hoist Caleb up to the platform, but 18-month-olds aren’t too cooperative when it comes to sitting in a hammock.
The upper level has a medical helicopter, a television news station and a radio booth. This piqued the interest of the older kids — the younger ones just liked pushing all the buttons. A big hit on this floor was the theater — even Daxon dressed up, in a lion costume, chasing the kids around the stage on all fours. Kids can control the spotlights, change the scenery, and be free to do what kids always want to do — play peek-a-boo and run in and out of the curtains.
In a section called The Studio, there are various tables of different building blocks, wind tunnels for experimenting, gears to fit together and all sorts of building, sculpting and drawing. The boys spent time on a huge magnetic wall, building tracks with various-sized tubes and slots that stick to the wall, and then dropping Ping-Pong balls to travel through their construction. At one point, the ball came shooting out of a piece of tube and fell into another tube a few inches away. It was fun to watch them work together.
All that playing, discovering and creating made everyone hungry. We opted to leave our cars at The Gateway and hop on Trax up to the Lion House Pantry, located at South Temple and State Street. The Connect Pass is good for about $9.99 worth of food. The Lion House Pantry works similar to a cafeteria line — we chose from soup in a bread bowl, roast beef, roasted turkey or catfish, or a kids plate of chicken tenders. Each entree comes with two sides — I chose mashed potatoes and green beans, Grace chose rice and Jell-O — and a famous Lion House roll. We had enough credit with the Connect Pass to get some cookies on the way out, too.
The restaurant tables made us feel like we were eating in a cozy pioneer kitchen. The kids devoured their food and even stole some off Mom’s plate. With cookies in hand, we walked the block back to the train stop. Just the walk between the Lion House and the train was interesting — we saw window washers on a skyscraper and ooh-ed and ahh-ed over the massive construction cranes hauling steel beams at the City Creek development site. And riding the train was just that to the kids — a ride.
We were back at our cars by 3 p.m. Parting ways with our friends, who had football practice, I headed up to Snowbird for a Tram ride with Grace and Caleb. The 45-minute drive served as a perfect time for the kids to nap and get rejuvenated for our next adventure of the day.
We got to the resort at 4:15, perfect timing to catch the next Tram leaving at 4:30. We walked around the plaza, Grace watching the bouncy castle and slide with envious eyes. But she was soon distracted by the Tram, which is like getting on a city bus without seats. The Tram, operating since 1971, travels 1.6 miles for a trip that lasts about 9 minutes. In the winter, it transports 120 skiers every 20 minutes.
At the top of Hidden Peak, an elevation of 11,000 feet, the air is cool and crisp. In downtown Salt Lake City, it was overwhelmingly hot, so Snowbird was a welcome relief. I didn’t dare get the kids out of the stroller — I didn’t feel like chasing them over the edge — but even at their young age, they were in awe of the view. Visitors can explore at the top and take the Tram back down, hike over to another chair lift and take that down, or make their way down to the bottom on foot.
If you’ve never been to Snowbird in the summer, it is truly something to behold. While the snow-covered mountainside is beautiful, being on top of a mountain in the summertime — without having to be a mountaineer — is really something. We could see the Salt Lake Valley to the west and Alta to the east. The trip took about 40 minutes in all — with 20 minutes of exploration time between Tram rides.
We took a trip to the bouncy castle and slide for $1 (part of the kids activities at the Snowbird Center), and by 5:45 p.m. we were back in the car, headed for home.
What made it all worth it? Grace said over and over how much fun she had, and both kids went to sleep that night without a fight, and even slept in an hour longer than usual.
OUR GROUP
Caleb, 18 months
Grace, 3
Ella, 3
Jaggyr, 5
Kazen, 10
Daxon, 14
