Sun Valley: Razzle-dazzle days at dollar mountain

Sun Valley's stunning scenery is just like that on the postcards, writes Angela Saurine

Ice skating in front of the lodge at Sun Valley Resort, Idaho

Sun Valley's stunning scenery is just like that on the postcards, writes Angela Saurine

THERE'S a box sitting in the corner of my bedroom that contains the few remaining possessions I have that belonged to my Dad, who died when I was 11.

Among them are an old film projector, framed blown-up photos from his horse trotting days and a thick pile of postcards from his travels around the world.

The cards come from everywhere from Hong Kong to Austria but there is one place that is disproportionately represented; Sun Valley, Idaho.

Mostly jokingly addressed to "Little Awful Angie", the postcards make it sound like a magical place for a little girl.

He compares the mountains to the kind you would see in Walt Disney movies and the grizzly bears to Yogi.

In one he describes a white rabbit that scampers away in the snow when he gets too close; in another a squirrel with nuts in its hand which jumps from tree to tree then into its little house.

Every now and then, over the years, I would pull the postcards out and read them, and long dreamt of visiting.

So it is hard to know how to feel when I actually get there, more than two decades after his passing, and stare up at the ski mountain he described in his brochures as one of the best he had skied.

It doesn't take long to see what my dad liked about the place.

As well as the consistent, steep-pitched ski runs, Sun Valley positively oozes heritage, celebrity and elegance.

The resort was brought to life by the chairman of the board of the Union Pacific Railroad, Averell Harriman, who in 1935 decided to develop a ski destination to attract passenger traffic to the west.

He asked a man named Count Felix Schaffgotsch to find the perfect place.

After rejecting other areas for being too high, too windy, too close to the city or too remote, Schaffgotsch was almost set give up before coming across the old mining town of Ketchum.

The world's first chairlift (now long gone) was built at Dollar Mountain, which is now the beginners ski hill.

Serious skiers head to "Baldy", where most of the runs can only be described as thigh burners.

Legend has it that the horses that grazed in this area would always gather in a particular sunny part of the valley and that was the spot where Sun Valley Lodge was built.

Steve Hannagan, who transformed a sand dune into Miami Beach, was enlisted as publicist and celebrities quickly began to stream in from Hollywood.

The walls of the lodge are now lined with black-and-white photos featuring the faces of regulars such as Lucille Ball, Jackie Kennedy and Gary Cooper.

I'm on the bus to the River Run base one morning when a woman in her 80s wearing a red one-piece ski suit starts telling everyone who will listen what she expects the snow conditions to be for the day.

"I've been skiing for 50 years, and skiing in Sun Valley for 40," she declares proudly.

"I used to come up on the Snowball Express from LA 24 hours with 300 drunken skiers. It was wild."

The train, she says, didn't stop at the base of the ski mountain and one man would throw his skis off as it passed then jump off after them to be first on the hill.

The celebrity connection has not waned with time. Another item in that box of my Dad's is a photo of him with Clint Eastwood, who has a house in Sun Valley.

The ski run Leigh's Lane is named after the actress Janet Leigh, whose daughter Jamie Lee Curtis still skis here with her children.

Arnold Schwarzenegger, who also has a run named after him, has a house here too, as does Tom Hanks, director Rob Reiner and Aussie surf champion Nat Young.

Bruce Willis owns a place at nearby Hailey where the airport is across the road from his ex-wife Demi Moore's and a stone's throw from The Mint bar that Willis owns.

One of the key drawcards for Sun Valley is, naturally enough, the sunshine and there's a technique to skiing this resort in order to follow the golden glow over the snow.

We ski the centre around the new River Run gondola in the morning, then head to the left side and have lunch at the grand Seattle Ridge Lodge, which has a massive three-sided stone fireplace and 360-degree views of The Rockies from the terrace. In the afternoon we head to the right side of the resort, Warm Springs.

The attention to detail at Sun Valley is extraordinary. When it snows, anti-freeze is pumped under the pavers to heat them and keep the path clear. The bathrooms in the day lodges are made of marble while the resort's outdoor music pavilion was built from the same stone quarried to build Rome's Colosseum.

There are no hamburgers or hot dogs on sale in the swish on-mountain eateries, where you can instead try local delicacies such as elk with a good glass of red wine.

The lobby of Sun Valley Lodge, about 1.5km outside Ketchum, has a large open fireplace looking out over an outdoor ice-skating rink lit by fairy lights at night.

Ketchum is filled with the kind of bars you'd see in the cult 1990s TV show Northern Exposure.

My favourite, The Pioneer Saloon, or Pio as the locals call it, has long-horned elk, buffalo and deer mounted along the walls necks and all.

Two antique mountain guns hang above the bar.

Idaho is famous for its potatoes because its volcanic soil provides ideal growing conditions and at the Pio you can get a special Jim's Spud for $US9.95 ($A10.50).

The dish is named after a staff member's favourite fillings grilled teriyaki prime rib, grilled onions, melted cheese, butter, sour cream, chives and black pepper.

It's meant to be a side but I have mine as a main and still can't finish it.

When he went to Sun Valley, my dad used to book out a place called The Ranch at nearby Elkhorn and cook for all the Aussies.

I take a day off skiing and head there on the bus to check it out.

These days, however, you are more likely to find Australians staying at Alan Pennay's condos, which are about as close as you can get to ski-in ski-out accommodation in Sun Valley.

When I meet Alan, he is wearing black leather gloves and a fluffy, hooded fur coat. Distinguished yet flamboyant, with hair and teeth as white as the snow, Alan moved to Sun Valley as a piano player and still fills in at the Duchin bar in Sun Valley Lodge from time to time.

It turns out he knew my dad.

Alan opened Pennays in 1972 and throws regular parties at his bachelor pad, which has a full bar, open fireplace and grand piano overlooking the mountain. I imagine in his younger days he would have been just like one of the characters in the black and white 1940s film Sun Valley Serenade, which revolves around a group of musicians and screens non-stop on one of the channels at Sun Valley Lodge.

Sun Valley's relative inaccessibility at least in comparison with resorts such as Vail keeps the crowds down. Everyone who comes here seems to have been introduced by someone else.

I'm not sure what my trip to Sun Valley achieved.

I can't say whether I was happy to feel closer to my dad, or disappointed I didn't feel close enough. But I know as I played shuffleboard with some locals in a basement bar, I was coming to love Sun Valley in my own way, and it was a buzz to see landmarks from my father's postcards, such as the red barn that marks the entrance to Sun Valley and the cute Idaho power station hut beside it.

On my final night I take a sleigh ride to Trail Creek Cabin for dinner.

During the moonlit ride home an elderly couple sit hugging their grandchildren under thick woollen blankets as we take in the smell of horses and sounds of bells ringing.

At one point we even spot a fox.

I come to the conclusion that, with or without the family connection, Sun Valley is a truly special place.

> The writer was a guest of United Airlines and Sun Valley.

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Wish you were here

Getting there
Fly United Airlines (www.unitedairlines.com.au, 131 777) to Los Angeles then connect with Horizon Air (www.horizonair.com, 0011 800 2527 5200) to Hailey. From there it is a short bus ride to Sun Valley.

Getting around
The lodge, town and ski bases at River Run, Warm Springs and Dollar Mountain are linked by a free service.

Staying there
Sun Valley Lodge is a 148-room luxury hotel with an adjoining glass-enclosed outdoor pool, outdoor ice rink, beauty salon, spa and game room.

See www.sunvalley.com Pennay's (www.pennays-sunvalley.com) has one-bedroom condominiums from $US235 ($A245) a night and two-bedroom apartments from $US295 ($A305) a night.

More: www.visitsunvalley.com