We're not in Utah anymore. Main Street Salt Lake City has turned into New York, complete with ticket hawkers, tourist traps, coffee stands and foreign accents.
And Saturday afternoon, downtown became downright bicoastal, with the Beach Boys turning Washington Square into Southern California.
It was a surreal sight. The crowd around the City-County Building was stadium-rock-concert size, surging along the sidewalks, into the street and collecting on the steps of the Matheson Courthouse, where downtown festival-goers had a good view of the stage across the street.
Why come downtown on a day when mobs of 70,000 are expected, parking is nonexistent and Main Street is a sea of tourists?
"That's exactly why we came," said Dianne Fuller, Salt Lake City. "I love the energy and all the people on the streets. People are walking everywhere."
Fuller caught the free shuttle bus from Liberty Park to Pioneer Park and chatted with Lori Putt of Canfield, Ohio. Putt's son, Alex, turned 13 Saturday and found a gigantic party welcoming him into adolescence. The next week will be the culmination of six years of anticipation.
"We started (planning to come to Salt Lake City) when you got the bid," Putt said. "There wasn't a whole lot that would stop us from coming."
Putt and her son, plus her sister, Salt Laker Rita Shaw, didn't know what they were in for as the bus neared downtown.
And the scenes on Main Street, on State Street near City Hall and on 200 South alongside the Gallivan Center looked very little like Utah. The inversion that has muddied valley air in recent weeks had been swept away, so Salt Lakers could look up, see the mountains, and remember where they were.
But on the ground, the Olympics had completed the transformation.
"We just wanted to see the Beach Boys," said Michelle Millburn, Centerville.
She was part of the 10-person-deep line inching toward the security checkpoint at Washington Square. A few minutes later, she was in, and part of the throng cheering the band's startlingly clear, clean renditions of "God Only Knows," "Good Vibrations" and "Kokomo."
"We're incredibly excited," said Sheldon Green, North Salt Lake.
He grew up with the Beach Boys, in San Diego, about 80 miles from the band's hometown of Hawthorne, Calif. Green has long since acclimated to Utah's cold; he moved here in 1972.
His endurance was tested, however, as he waited in line to enter Washington Square. There's one good thing about squeezing into a crush of people: It's warmer.
"You've got to get the feel for it" by going outdoors on a frigid day like this, said David Reynolds of Glenwood Springs, Colo. "That's part of the Winter Olympics."
Reynolds had already been up to Park City for Saturday's ski jumping competition; he came back to Salt Lake City and took TRAX downtown to see Anheuser Busch's Bud World at the Gallivan Center.
Like his line mates, Reynolds was in good humor, despite having to spend 20 minutes getting the feel for 24 degrees and a persistent wind.
"We couldn't resist" coming downtown, he said, joking, "to be honest, I have no idea what line we're in."
Is he going to have a cold beer when he gets into the Gallivan Center? Do people really want cold drinks in this weather? "Yeah," Reynolds said.
His plan for the evening was to have dinner at the Macaroni Grill, where he'd made reservations, and then go see the Dave Matthews Band at the Olympic Medals Plaza.
"We heard it's free," Reynolds said.
Uh-oh. It's free, but you need a ticket, and those were all passed out awhile ago.
Then again, there are a dozen or so ticket brokers across the street, saying, "What do you want? I've got everything. Figure skating? Tonight? No. Hockey?" One guy has Medals Plaza passes for $125 apiece, and he's happy to help you afford them.
"There's a bank right over there," said the broker from Manchester, England, where "it's not as cold as it is here, yeah?"
E-MAIL: durbani@desnews.com