Day 46 | M.L.K. weekend

f*ck my life!  Yesterday's fresh tracks deboggle was nothing compared to what I did today.  Since no one touched the pristine 46cm that fell the other night on Whistler, I was hoping for a high level class in snowboard school.  As luck would have it, I was assigned to three level four kids who all seemed as anxious to hit the new snow as I was.

It's Martin Luther King weekend so it's a busy Saturday/Sunday with lots of Americans visiting from the States.  Line ups were huge:  back to the kiosk in the village, out of station at Olympic, Garbanzo was out of the fences and I'm sure the remaining chairs were just as busy.  Great day to work since when you're in uniform, you get to cut the public line and take a "short cut" to the chair.  The gondola was chucked full with ten people per cabin so I grabbed my kids and we headed up Garbanzo Chair.

Weather today was amazing!  Blue skies, very little wind, white fluffy fresh snow everywhere.  Two thirds of the way up Garbanzo, we went through some fog, and as we neared the top, the sun was shining through the fog and through the snow covered trees.  I decided to pull out my small point and shoot camera from my pocket to take a few pics.  I carry my camera with me every day in order to get images for this blog.  As I was putting my camera back into my pants pocket, it slid out of the camera case and fell off Garbanzo Chair.  I was stunned!!!  It fell in an area that isn't very easy to reach with a snowboard on your feet.  It also fell in an area that had untouched perfect soft snow at least 5 to 6 feet deep.  After screaming out loud in disbelief, I kissed the camera goodbye!

When conditions are this amazing, losing a camera didn't upset me as much as you might think.  Snow levels were past your knees in some places with the wind drifts but definitely up to your shins everywhere else.  I took my class down Tokum,  a super powdery blue run that not many people take the time to trek to.  My boys and I were loving this run!  Powder was everywhere.  It was a bit tracked out but nothing crazy.  Once I taught the kids how to ride over the powder instead of sink in it, they were loving it as well.

After lunch, my co-worker offered to take my class with her class for one run while I went down the liftline to try and find my camera.  Since my Supervisor also suggested I go look for it, I took her up on her offer, gave her my kids, and I headed to where I think the camera was located.  I tracked through snow that was up to my knees and found a hole where I thought the camera would be.  I took my glove off and stuck my hand as far down as I could but I felt nothing.  I tracked around the area a bit more but there was still no camera to be found.  Bummer!

Now I had the great fortune of having to get back to my class via the run directly under Garbanzo Chair. I don't know the name of the run, if there is a name.  I think it's not technically a run marked on the trail map.  It's definitely not a place an instructor in uniform should be.  Luckily the run was super powdery and although I was very nervous going down (at one point there is a 20ft cliff on this run) it ended up being an easy run if you took your time, picked your line, and having 4 foot of fresh powder didn't hurt either.  I am going to take this run more often on my days off.

Anyway, I ended up back at Garbanzo Chair and uploaded again - looking to catch up with my class.  By the time I reached the top, they were half way back down so I headed back to them toward Tokem.  I ended up burying myself in snow up to my knees.  I had to dig out my board, unclip and trek out of the snow.  tee hee, fun!  Since I didn't have my class with me, I was able to rip the run through the powder without having to stop.  It was really fun.

Finally I found Jess and my kids.  We changed up the groups once last time and we headed back up Garbanzo.  Come to think of it, I didn't go to the Roundhouse one time today.  Hmmm.... weird.  Anyway, the boys wanted to hit Tokum again so that's what we did.  We ended with that run and we all had a great time, even with losing my camera.  I guess it goes without mentioning that a picture will not be accompanying this post today.