The crunching of snow, the swish of sleds, the shrieks of kids as they hurtle down a neighborhood hill at top speed—it’s sledding time in Daybreak. Everywhere you go in our community, you encounter sled tracks and trudge marks on hills that used to be grassy slopes. It seems to me that every hill in Daybreak has been tried by sledders looking for the perfect slope, or just one close to home.

We took our own sledding tour of Daybreak the other day but soon discovered that most of the big hills face south and don’t hold their snow very long on a sunny winter day. After some disappointments, we were able to find a couple of places with plenty of good, compacted snow on a north-facing slope and managed to get our fill of sledding thrills but just be forewarned—if you want to hit the really steep sledding spots in Daybreak, don’t wait around.

What follows is a list of the various sledding locations in Daybreak. Please refer to the attached map for clarification. If you have another favorite spot (that you wouldn’t mind sharing) leave a note in the comments and I’ll add it in. Of course, if you ask me, the best sledding hill is the one you can walk home from fastest for a steaming cup of hot chocolate and a snuggle by the warm fire.

1.       East end of Rowdy Park (or the Swimming Pool Park) in Eastlake: One of those sunken field parks, this place offers some of the best safe sledding in Daybreak. There’s plenty of slope space to accommodate a sledding crowd, and half of it faces north for long-lasting snow. The surrounding streets have negligible traffic but there’s not much park-side parking if you’re driving up. Local kids have built up some great snow jumps to get your sled airborne.

CLICK READ MORE TO SEE REST OF THE ARTICLE

Attachments:

Daybreak Sledding Map.pdf

[ ]

227 Kb

After living in Daybreak among so many great parks, how many times have you had this conversation (or something like it):

"I'll meet you at the park."

"Which park?"

"You know, the one on this street and that street."

"Um...is that the one with the long slide and the twirly thing?"

"No, it's the one with the short slide and the twisty thing."

"What? Which one is that?

"Exactly. These Daybreak parks, as much as we love them, need some names--names that we can all recognize and use on a regular basis when we're talking to our friends or our children or our spouse or anyone we might want to meet at the park. There's one playground near my home which has been called, among other things, the Bumblebee Park, the Twirly Park, and the Birdhouse Park. They're all great names for a great place, but it's getting confusing.

Now, we have an opportunity to name our parks officially! Take those names you use most often for the parks around the neighborhood and put them in the form available when you log onto www.daybreakliving.net. Remember, they are looking for names that fit the parks as well as Daybreak as a whole, so even though you may call your favorite park "Debbie's Park", that name probably won't be chosen.

But that's the best part. After all the ideas are submitted, we--meaning Daybreak residents--get to vote in February to decide which park will officially be named what! So, I guess if you can get all your friends and their friends to vote for "Debbie's Park" maybe you could get your favorite park named for you after all. Campaign buttons, anyone?

So, start naming those parks! When the snow melts and the world finally thaws this spring, we can say, "I'll meet you at Debbie's Park," and our friends will be able to find us. But choose something a little more universal than "Debbie's Park", please.

Ever notice those practical-minded Daybreak planners have a thing for dual-purposes? Take our beautiful Oquirrh Lake, for example. It's not only a great recreation spot with its walking trails, docks, and boats, but the water also irrigates much of the public spaces in Daybreak--or, so I understand. Our homes in Daybreak are not only attractive with their many windows and high-quality siding materials, they also reduce our energy bills by letting the sunlight in while keeping the heat and cold out. Playground equipment around here provides not only something fun and often unique for the kids to play on, but also an interesting sculptural element in the landscape.

The east end of Rowdy Park is one of these doubly functioning features of Daybreak. Not only is it a lush green park where community gatherings like the upcoming Fundraiser Park Party for Huntsman Cancer can be held (Saturday, August 30th from 6pm to 9pm), but it's also part of Daybreak's rainwater collection network.

Between the swimming pool and tennis courts on Indigo Sky Way and the community gardens on Vermillion Drive is a giant, lawn-covered drainage ditch. A lot like the one at Central Park, there's plenty of open space here for large picnics, soccer games, and community functions, too. And the sloped sides will be a neighborhood sledding hotspot come winter. Let's just hope during Saturday's fundraiser we don't have another 100-year rainstorm like the one that created Founder's Village swimming pool last year.

By the way, Rowdy Park is the corridor park that runs from the "spider web" climbing toy on Oquirrh Lake Road and Isla Daybreak Road, past the front of the new Eastlake Elementary School, all the way to the rose garden between Belleville Way and Navarro Way in the east.

Hillside Park—you know, the one on Open Hill Drive where the stream tumbles through—has some great features. There are picnic tables and a small pavilion which is precious and rare in Daybreak. The soccer field provides much-needed open green space in our community of small yards. And there’s the stream, which is not only great fun for the kids but absolutely beautiful with its stone wall and geometric structure softening into a natural stream bed. But the whole place is looking pretty straggly these days.

It sort of feels like the park got off to a great start but was never really finished, let alone maintained. The field is not so much a lawn as a patchy, muddy mess. The half-hearted landscaping is slowly dying from bad irrigation and weeds. If you want to have a cookout, you bring your own grill (no kidding, I’ve seen people haul their shiny patio barbeques up in the back of a pickup). And while my school-age boys love the physical challenge of the playground equipment, it’s not much fun for little ones. In fact, the whole park is not so great for parents with little kids. Between fears that they’ll fall in the creek and drown or fall off the climbing structure and break a limb, you pretty much follow your toddlers around in nervous dread.

Well, good news for moms and dads and tots and, in fact, all Daybreak residents: Hillside Park is getting a facelift! It’s been turned over to South Jordan City and they’re planning some great improvements to be implemented in the next year (thanks to some lobbying from our favorite Daybreak activist: Scoop). The stream will stay—we wouldn’t want it out anyway—but a big new playground will give those busy two-year olds a safe place to play. Also, besides general upkeep and landscaping, there will be trees planted around and inside the park and along the trail providing much-needed shade. Gravel and bark areas will turn into sturdy asphalt and soft grass where appropriate. New grills will be installed so you can leave yours in your backyard. And best of all, a new public bathroom will keep the local homeowners from having to share theirs.

I’m really excited about all these changes. Hillside Park, you see, is near and dear to my heart. It provided that final tipping of the scales to move our family to Daybreak. Last year, we’d been looking at house after house after house for sale in other parts of the valley. But I’d promised my kids we’d go to Daybreak one more time to visit that park they’d been begging to see—the one with the funky climbing toy that looked like a wavy sculpture. As we were walking along the stream, marveling in the springtime beauty of wildflowers and grasses around us, and as I watched my kids’ joy at playing in the water and rocks I thought about what a wonderful place this was. I thought how lucky these people were who lived in Daybreak and could visit this beautiful park—and the others, too—every day. And then I realized, hey, we could live here. And so we did. And now, I’m one of those lucky Daybreak residents who can enjoy Hillside Park as it reaches its full potential.