My wife and I just completed a ski trip at Winter Park in Colorado. We opted to drive in order to save money as the savings in travel time turned out to only be an hour or so vs. flying. Before setting out I checked Google Maps to see the fastest way to get there and back. I had 3 possible routes to use with only 8 minutes separating the quickest 2. I decided to take US 40 from Salt Lake all the way to Winter Park on the way out as it indicated it would be the fastest way.
The drive to Winter Park went well and we arrived a little after dark. The travel time came very close to Google's estimate. We checked into our on-hill condo and enjoyed being able to wake up late and walk over to the gondola as the resort opened. Eventually our 3 days of skiing came to a close and it came time to return home. This time I decided to take the alternate route. Yes it added 30 miles to the trip but was only supposed to add 8 minutes and allowed us to take I-80 back to Salt Lake.
On the way out, we had to be very careful as US-40 is mostly 2 lanes and full of wildlife. In other words, you have to watch out so you don't hit a deer and ruin your car. This makes exceeding the speed limit extremely unwise.
Taking a different way back turned out to be very scenic and we got to see a part of the country we had yet to visit. Once we got on I-80, we simply turned on cruise control at 80 miles per hour as that is the speed limit most of the way. I didn't expect to get to Salt Lake until 7:30pm based on the time estimate given by Google Maps. We stopped once for gas and then another time for 75 cent ice cream cones in Little America (highly recommended). Imagine my surprise when we pulled into our driveway an hour before we were supposed to. I like it when Google Maps is wrong sometimes. Now I only wish I had known that on the way out as we might have gotten into Winter Park before nightfall.
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