Day 67 - Flute

Start of the hike....

Today I was on a mission: hike the Flute.  I wanted to do it last season and never did.  Today seemed like the perfect opportunity and I took it.  I was on Fitzsimmons chair by 9am and at the start of the hiking road by 10:30am.  To reach Flute Bowl, skiers and boarders must hike a mile on a track out to Flute Ridge.  The jaunt was easier than I thought with an elevation gain of maybe 400ft.  It only took me about a half hour (I think I stood in line longer at Harmony Chair) but it was a great work out!!  

Once I reached the summit, I saw the most amazing views of the magnificent mountains of the Garibaldi Provincial Park.  It wasn't a perfect blue bird day but the views were stunning just the same. (see video)

I had no idea where I was going but after taking a gander from Symphony Chair, the freshest tracks looked to be the furtherest away from the Flute Bowl itself.  I headed that way and found myself in waist deep pow!  I didn't bring my powder board but I wish I had.  The run was awesome just the same.

I ended up in a nice gladed run that took me back to Symphony Chair.  I was sweaty and exhausted.  If I had the pow board, I might have gone for another run but I was pressed for time.  

 Black Tusk from Flute

Flute Bowl view from Harmony Ridge

Day 66 - progression

I conceded my Level 5 riders to Carly. Not sure why, just wasn't in the mood I guess. Instead I took a brother and sister Level 2 team. They had been in snowboard school all week and still couldn't turn.  Spent the day on the lower third of the mountain soaking up the sun and darkening my goggle tan!  From what I heard, the snow up top was still really nice.  I took pride in getting my snowboarders turning before lunch.  

"When you slammed the front door shut, a lot of others opened up. So did my eyes so I could see that you never were the best for me." - Daughtry

Day 65 - amazing powder Part II

Great conditions continued today. As I mentioned yesterday, there is still a lot of untracked pow to be found. I picked up my level 5 class and we immediately hit the slopes!  I wanted to head out to Symphony but the boys were more interested in doing jumps/drops and trees.  So instead we stayed around Emerald Chair and ran gladed runs all afternoon.  First we hit Mom and Pop trees.  No one has touched those!  (going back there tomorrow)  Then Marmot.  Ran through the terrain park a few times where you can find untouched pow in the trees.  Anyway, I'm not going to give up my secret powder hunting runs on my blog.  Let's just say it was another amazing day!  The skies were blue and the sun was shining.  On a scale of one to ten, today was a ten!!  

Day 64 - Amazing P*O*W!

I awoke to what looked like a blizzard outside my window. While cleaning about a foot of snow off my vehicle, I prayed for a high level class so I could enjoy the magnificent powder that fell overnight.   In the last seven days, we've received 30inches of snow!  But what's even better?  The crowds have all left so most of this amazing stuff stays untracked for a longer period of time.

10 kids showed up to snowboard school today.  Quite a good number considering most of WB forecasts are so bad these days that 180 instructors were laid off last week.  Even the full time instructors who normally work a 5 day week have been cut down to 3 or 4 day weeks.  I obviously didn't get laid off but I did get my hours cut.

Anyway, lucky for me I ended up with the Level 5 class!!!  OH MY GOD the snow was amazing today!  And there was so much of it.  I swear there was 2ft in Marmot Trees.  Nothing was groomed... including cat tracks, which made it hell for snowboarders because boards don't go very far in soft packed powder snow on the flats.  

By late afternoon, there was still a ton of fresh powder to be found.  Not to mention it snowed it's ass off all day and into most of the evening.  My Level 5's are coming back tomorrow so I'm looking forward to finding all the stuff we missed today!!!! 

Day 63 - last day of WESP

Today was the last day of the Whistler Elementary School Program. Six weeks flew by! These kids must be blessed or something because it snowed 25cm (10 inches) overnight.  This is the third powder Monday during their program.  Unfortunately, this snow was very wet and heavy.  But at least it snowed because we desperately need it!  More of the white stuff forecasted for overnight.

Most of the kids were turning down easy greens by the end of the day.  We rode the Peak to Peak, found a ton of jumps and drops to go off, and ventured through a couple of bike trails.  I think they finished their season happy.  Even if they hated it, it had to be better than sitting in school all day!

Day 62 - * S * N * O * W *

Hell ya!  5cm in the last 24hrs.  Yup!  You are reading correctly..... the white stuff is back.  I think it's been over 2 weeks since we've seen any kind of flurry.  I got into the village around noon thirty, found Andy on Blackcomb, and we rode for a few hours.  The snowflakes were so big and wet that it was hard to keep my goggles clear.  Ride out was super choppy and the rising freezing level was very noticeable.  But it's still coming down in the village so I'm crossing my fingers for a pow day tomorrow.

Day 61- winding down Prez Week

The final sunny day in the limitless amount of bountiful sunshine this season at Whistler Blackcomb.  It is forecasted to be raining or cloudy when I wake on Sunday morning.  

Day 60 - it's official: my goggle tan is here!

After yesterday, I wasn't looking forward to going to work today.... but my day turned pretty good, thanks to Morgan.  Because our Adventure Camp kids basically stayed at the same level all week, we team taught 5 level three kids.  The purpose of Adventure Camp is to have the kids keep the same instructor for the entire week, which is why Morgan and I had two small classes instead of just one of us taking all 5 kids.  Anyways!  Not important!

What is important is that my day went well.  Once again the sun was shining!  and my goggle tan has officially arrived in Whistler.  

Day 59 - from the trenches

Sadness behind the mirrors....

Another day of my Adventure Camp kids and I can't wait for this week to be over.  I'm not going to speak ill of anyone, especially kids, .... so let me say once again: I can't wait for this week to be over!  

Now that I got that out of my system.

If you're looking for fun in the sun, come to Whistler.  We have abundant sunshine, blue skies, and big mountains as far as the eye can see.  In fact, you can have a 360 degree view of mountain after mountain after mountain.  It is beautiful!  It is spectacular!  Check it out! 

Day 58 - crazy day

The sun was shining and freezing levels are rising. In fact, at the end of the day, the temp in the village registered 44°F on my truck.  Abundant sunshine is still listed in the long term forecast. 

Morgan and I split up and shared nine Level 3s.  Other than a couple kids getting hurt, two skiers plowing right through us as we sat on the run (I have a huge bruise on my hip!), one crazy kid throwing a fit every couple hours, and one kid losing their pass-- it was a regular day.   

"What will be, will be." - Sail Away

Day 57 - yeeehaw!

Second day of Adventure Camp and I ended up with a class of 6.  The sun was shining bright all morning, but during the lunch hour, clouds quickly rolled in.  Unfortunately, they didn't bring any new snow.  Still no snow in the long term forecast.

"It seems the only blessing I have left to my name is not knowing what we could have been, what we should have been." - You'll Think of Me

Day 56 - this is what we do!

Snow! Sun! and fun!  It's super busy with President's Week so we have a ton of snowboarders in school.  It's very hectic, especially first thing in the morning, at lunch, and at the end of the day, but at the same time, it's kind of nice to have some hustle and bustle around the mountains and in the villages.  Instead of the normal 3-4 classes during the downtime, today we had 6-7 classes and most classes were filled with almost 8 kids in a class. 

I'm doing snowboard Adventure Camp this week and I have two kids who were Level 2.  I filled up the rest of the my class with some of the 13 other level 2's in Destination.  My kids needed to learn how to turn so we spent the entire day on the Olympic Chair.  Most of them were turning pretty well by the end of the day, and all of them said they had a good time so I guess it was a job well done.  Abundant sunshine is forecasted for the next 5 days in Whistler with freezing levels rising a bit.  The next few days should be really awesome being outside in the sunshine, working on that goggle tan. 

Day 55 - let President's Week begin

Not only is it the start of President's Week (traditionally a very busy week at Whistler) but it's also one year to the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics.  Whistler and Vancouver had been getting world wide recognition and there are many festivities planned in the coming week for the celebration.  

When I arrived at the village at 10am, the line for the gondola was completely wrapped through the fences and stretched half way to the guest relations hut.  Needless to say I wasn't too thrilled with the crowds.  Let me rephrase, I like the crowds in the village and all the hoopla, I just hate standing in lift lines.  

I uploaded on the Fitz chair and quickly got up on Garbonzo.  The sun was shining, it's still kind of cold in the Alpine, especially once you get moving.  The groomers were nice but everything that wasn't groomed is getting kind of hard and crunchy.  I managed to find a fresh patch of powder cutting between Ptarmigan and Olympic Chair but even the "secret jump" was kind of sketchy.  I was going to head back up at mid-station but the line was out the door.  Forget that!  I finished my run to the village and headed home to blog about my boring day.

Day 54 - yes more sun!

Clear skies and cold temperatures were on hand today.  I can't believe how much sun we are getting this season.  My goggle tan is coming along nicely, thank you.  Nothing but sun forecasted in Whistler Blackcomb for the next week.  Can you believe it?  Luckily the boys pictured above wore their orange goggles today.

Not much to report.  Had a high level three class of 5 kids.  It was cold up top but nice in the sun at the CLC.  Conditions were hard packed, icy on some runs (namely Dave Murray), and sunny!  Did I mention how sunny it's been lately? 

Day 53 - 2 fast 4 boys!

I picked up an all girl team for lessons today.  They were Level 3's and have been here all week.  We spent the day on easy green runs - snowboarding, and snowboarding, and snowboarding.  At lunch they came up with a team name:  2 fast 4 boys!

which is actually pretty ironic considering they were the slowest class I've had in years!

Day 52 - hanging with Morgan

It was a beautiful day to be back at work.  The sun was shining and the sky was blue.  Ten kids showed up to snowboard school and I got three brothers who were Level 4's.  We hit a few runs that were not groomed and they were hard and crusty (no fun!) so we decided to spend the day on groomed runs, looking for jumps and drops.

After lunch, Morgan and I combined our classes and took them to the Whistler Terrain Park to hit a couple of small jumps set up off to the side.  The boys handled the jumps well so we took another lap through.  That left us enough time to build a jump at the CLC.  Morgan built one heck of a jump and the boys worked on their skills until it was time to head home.  

Morgan hitting his bad ass jump!

Day 51 - a Kiwi, a waffle, and Splitz!

Another day off from work and another day of freeriding with the Kiwi.  Shortly after 10am, we were unloading the Excelerator Chair and heading up Glacier Express.  I told Simon I wanted to hit more of the Alpine today.  I figured it was a good opportunity to explore more of the terrain with someone who is familiar with runs up there.   

We had made plans to try the waffles at Crystal Hut so we bee-lined it to breakfast.  After we filled our stomachs with fruit and sugar, and not liking the conditions on Blackcomb too much, we made our way to the Peak to Peak Gondola to check out the Whistler Alpine.  The Peak was fogged in a bit so we hit a couple tree runs before heading to Peak to Creek.  The four mile run was not groomed and it was a LONG four miles on a snowboard.  Most of it was mogul'd out so you can imagine how tired my legs were after that run.  We took a nice hot chocolate break at Dusty's before heading up to Whistler Bowl.

Simon was telling me about this shady entrance to the bowl that he took yesterday.  He basically described how he had to drop a cliff about 5ft in order to enter.  We traversed our way over to this so-called shady entrance and as Simon stood over the cliff deciding if he should take the drop or not, I looked down and thought: "there is no way in hell I can do that standing up...... but I think I can get into it on my ass" -- which is what I did!

Thanks for the company Simon.  I'll get my ass to drop that cliff standing up before the season ends (maybe!).  Have a safe trip home.  GO SOX!!!!

Finished off the day at Splitz with Simon, Linda, and Kristina

Day 50 - Heli-boarding!!!!!

Coast Range Heliskiing ran an ad in the local paper back in November: Locals can be put on a stand-by list and given the opportunity to heliski for half the price.  Coast Range will call you the night before if they have an extra space in one of their groups.  I thought this would be a great opportunity to try heliskiing (or heliboarding in my case) -- and for half the price, even better!

For those who aren't into the snow scene, heliskiing is where a helicopter takes you to the top of the ski runs in the backcountry instead of on a main resort with chair lifts or gondolas.  Quite expensive but very much worth it.

Our group was picked up from the Westin around 8am and we drove up to Pemberton.  Only two guys (both from Denmark and here on holiday) booked a tour for today so that left two empty seats for standbys.  I grabbed one seat and another local guy grabbed the second.  Apparently, a normal group consists of up to 12 people so we were fortunate to have a "private" tour.   I thought I would have been the only snowboarder in the group but three of us had boards and only one was on skis.  

First thing we did was get avalanche training and learn how to use the avalanche transponders.   The second thing, we learned how to safely maneuver around the helicopter.  Next, we had the time of our life!

Being up in the helicopter was thrilling enough, never mind about the perfect snow - vast terrain - and peacefulness of having over 200,000 acres all to yourself.  Words cannot describe the experience so I made a video:  Heli-boarding!!

Make sure you check it out.

More pictures on Flickr

Day 49 - Guess who's back, back again?

After an exhausting weekend of doing things I don't even want to talk about, I finally got back out on the mountain.  And there was no one better to shred it with then my good friend, from New Zealand, Simon Ross.  I met Simon about three years ago when we both worked in Retail Support on Base 2.  In fact, it was Simon's idea to do a 100 day season and we both hit our goal in the 2006/2007 season.  When I found out he was a Boston Red Sox fan, we instantly became friends.  Not many Kiwis are Red Sox fans.  Simon has taken a two week holiday from his real job back in New Zealand to come out to BC and shred some pow.  Unfortunately, there isn't much pow for Simon to ski but he's having a good time non-the-less.

We spent the morning on Blackcomb.  Conditions on the groomers were good.  The trace amount of snow we received overnight did a good job of covering up the icy conditions from the day before (so I was told).  After lunch the story had changed.  Most of the groomed runs had become mostly ice so we took the Peak to Peak over to Whistler.  We only took a couple runs on Whistler before calling it a day.  

Day 48 - the end of a great week

Finished up my work week with three guys in Level 5.  We spent most of today in the terrain parks, hitting jumps and boxes.  When the snow is soft, my confidence level is amazingly high in the park and along the sides of trails on the mountain.  I remember when I had a hard/scary time ollie'ing the lips of runs and now I'm ripping them up.  I caught so much air on one jump that I scared the crap out of myself.  I landed it though so that was sweet.  Blackcomb was a bit icy on some runs (nothing new).  I don't think I caught any ice on Whistler, not even when we ran Dave Murray down to Creekside.... and there's always ice going to Creekside.  

It was fun hanging out with a great kid this week.  He heads back home tomorrow.  Kids like him are the reason why I love my job so much.  

 

Day 47 - another KILLER day

What do you get when you combine sun, warm temperatures, great snow, friends, and cool kids?  You get one killer day on Whistler Blackcomb!  

My job is way too important to take seriously.  My level 5 boys returned for another day of shredding the gnar.  In the morning we took two laps through the bike trail off of Dave Murray.  It was so much fun.  I had never been in there but had wanted to try it since last season.  After lunch we headed over to Blackcomb.  (I didn't have an opinion either way when the Peak to Peak came to fruition but I have to say, I am definitely a fan of the gigantic gondola now.  Connecting the two mountains opens up so much more terrain when you're teaching and bored with Whistler runs.)  Anyway, we headed over to Blackcomb and took a run through the Terrain Garden.  We then ran up to 7th Heaven, spent a little time up there.  Then we hit the Crystal Chair and found a ton of pow on Twist and Shout.  Back up Excaliber and down to the village.  Still had some time left so back up to the CLC for a drink of water and back to the village.  We were all exhausted by 3:30pm.  Again, fingers crossed for great conditions again tomorrow.

Sarah and Carly enjoying a little "sun time" -

Day 46 - Symphony!

Looking towards Harmony

There were 5 kids signed up for snowboard school today. Lucky for me, two of them were Level 5's.  We had an early lunch and since we got about a foot of fresh pow yesterday, I figured it would be a great day to ride Symphony.  

Boy did I make the right call because...... IT WAS AMAZING!!!  The best day of the season for me so far.   We hit the tree runs towards Jeff's Ode to Joy.  There were a few fresh tracks to be found but the snow was so soft, it didn't matter that you weren't the first one to hit it.  We spent and hour and a half out there before we had to start heading back down to the village.

The boys are returning tomorrow and I'm crossing my fingers the conditions out there don't change over night.   

The Black Tusk from Harmony around 2:45pm

Day 45 - Snow-news is good news!

I cleared nearly a foot of new snow off my truck this morning and I couldn't wait to get to work!  Even though I had my low-level WESP class, I knew they had the ability to go straight to the powder and I couldn't wait!  Normally we leave the Creek at 9am sharp, but because of the snow and road conditions, we weren't able to get up the gondola until after 9:30am.  A few cars skidded out on the Sea to Sky which lead to alternating traffic, which meant, most of my kids coming from Squamish were running very late.

What we decided to do was have a few instructors wait for the late comers at the base and then have some instructors combine the same level classes and head up the hill.  Two kids from my class showed up, so I took them and four of Duncan's kids and I headed up the gondola.  We all strapped in and headed for the crazy powder on Expressway.  

This is the fourth week of WESP and none of these kids had ever been in powder before.  They had no idea what was in store for them.  They found out pretty quickly how amazing powder can be and they were all stoked for the great conditions!!!!

Once we got back down to Creek for lunch, three more of my kids showed up so Duncan and I switched back up to our regular kids and my class took another lap from Creek to Roundhouse back to Creek.  After lunch, most of the powder had been tracked out but the snow was still good as it wasn't ice.

I soaked up as much as I could today.  Freezing levels and headed back up over 2,000metres for the next four days, with sun at the beginning of the week and possible rain for the end of the week.  So far it's been a very disappointing season.......  but it's a season none the less.  So no complaining.