Cruising day at Whistler

Haven't been on the snow for TWO WEEKS(!) due in part to hunting for a place to live and in part due to homework. It always takes a couple weeks for me to get the feeling for each class and get into the rhythm of doing the homework. ANYWAY, it was time I got some snow!

Enter Kiyoka: "Wanna come to Whistler?" Silly question!! The arrangements were a bit last minute - 6am on the day we went so I met Trung and Kiyoka up there for a day of sub-zero fun.

You may remember the setting of the photo above from Mum's visit in September - its Whistler Peak.


Kiyoka's highlight of the day was undoubtedly the "Robins" that she was feeding from her hand - and once she did half the lift queue joined in!











I think the "Robins" survive just on the tourist tibits as the snow is 10-15ft deep up here

SARA: (or anyone) what type of birds are these? Kiyoka insisted they were Robins but I'm more than a little sceptical!








We had a great day though - nothin too strenuous and plenty of blue sky



the view from Whistler of Blackcomb



We even stopped for a quick bite to eat - such luxury! Even the view from the cafe ain't half bad! (this is the top station of the Whistler gondola Mum)










Kiyoka in action - she can sense a camera even at altitude in sub-zero temperatures!











For our last run, we dropped over the back onto the Peak to Creek run - we saw about 2 people on the WHOLE mountain!

(click the pics to enlarge)

eeeh! Yours truly admiring the view





the skiing is taking its toll on my body - look at my bandy legs and knobbly knees!!


From this point we headed through the frozen trees (stage right) and down a steep bowl in-between the rocks. Kiyoka (bless her) hadnt done this kind of thing before so got a bit worried about manoeuvring between the rocks on the super-steep slope but she did great - well done K!!



and with just a final run to the bottom, that was our day done. It was fun though and I'm sure we'll do it again soon.....maybe I should try it on the snowboard next time??!!!!!!!

I'm Moving!

At last, I've found a place to call my own (as long as I pay the rent) in Kitsilano :-)

It's right by the green arrow (click on the pic to see it bigger)

To those who don't know, Kits' is a district of Vancouver separated from Downtown (the city) by a bit of water (False Creek) - just at t'other end of Burrard Bridge

From my new place I'm a ten minute walk from Downtown or Granville Island (incredible market, shops, a museum and a water-taxi ride from Downtown) or even less to Vanier Park, home of "Bard in the Park" the summer long Shakespeare productions, the Maritime Museum, Space Centre (cough cough) and planetarium - home of the psychedelic late night show!


Mum should be happy cos when she checks "The Bridge" webcam it'll be the weather a couple hundred metres from my place :-D

Getting back to the "tour".... of course, the best bit is that I now only have 2 mins to walk to Kits' Beach - also pretty handy for watching the fireworks in the summer that are off Sunset Beach just across the water.






And next to the beach is Kits' Pool - all 137 heated meters of it :-D - I used to loose count doing a mile in a normal (25m) pool (60 lengths) - no such problems here - it's just under 11!!!

- I move in on 31st Jan or there-abouts - I even have an under-cover parking space!!

Well, I'd better get back to my economics homework

Whistler Creekside

Still reeeeeeling from jet lag after only one night at home I drove up to Whistler on Thursday to take possession of my boss', Genn's condo :-D

Its a one bedroom place at Creekside - a few k's from the main village, served by the lower lifts. Jon and Michele came up later and brought curry :-D

hmm, I dont think I had enough curry on my visit to England :-(

anyway, the condo is done out with a lot of good gear so it's brilliant job benefit!!

On Friday we got up, geared up and went to the lifts - only to come home again with our tail between our legs - the conditions weren't great - minimal visibility, top of the mountain shut due to high winds and only a couple inches of snow
:-(

Although I thought it was kinda fantastic that we are able to choose not to ski today - if I'd paid hard earned money to fly the Atlantic etc somehow I think I'd have been up there on the first lift!

Instead we decided to mooch around the village - Michele had faaaaar too much energy for us old men so she ran to the village via the scenic route while Jon and I took the bus ;-)

by the time we'd finished mooching (and watching Borat) there was a full scale blizzard which turned the roads to chaos - and this in Whistler where they're used to it snowing!

This pic shows the two-way highway 5 or 6 cars abreast trying to get up a slight incline! A good thing no-one in their right mind was leaving Whistler tonight!

Rich got stuck in the mayhem and therefore took 5-6 hours to get there (normally 2h)



Once Rich eventually made it we went for something to eat down the road - we walked!
By the time we came out there was at least a foot of new snow - and all this at the lowest point of the ski area ;-)









This is what my car looked like in the morning!













but the sky was clear, the powder was fresh and we were in the queue before the lift opened!!! In fact before the sun came up!

This is the view from the condo - the piste on the left is the downhill for the 2010 Olympics









So did we have a good day? Ohhhhhh yes. The piste closures the previous day meant there was anything from a foot and a half to three feet of fresh pow! It was the most amazing day - unfortunately I didnt take many pictures - we were far too busy having fun

I'm finally getting to grips with skiing in the deep stuff so it was extra special for me although surprisingly the most memorable moments were standing in the lift queue....


When the lift to the peak of Whistler opened, everyone swarmed to it but luckily we were amongst the first. Whilst we waited, trying to stay warm and discussing our options for our line down, someone in the crowd cheered. Of course, this made everyone look up at the empty mountain in front of us - only it wasnt empty anymore. Right at the top of a big wide open slope, four figures had appeared, pausing only briefly before snaking down the piste in parallel, about 30 or 40ft from each other. The crowd went wild! Shouting, cheering and screaming, it was like being at a rock concert when the band walks on stage - as Russ Abbot would say: what an atmosphere!

It was one of THOSE moments that I wont forget for a long time.

Besides the main slopes is a feature known as The Waterfall - a small cliff about 35ft high in the middle and it wasnt long before we were treated to a few "nutters" hucking this - to standing(?) ovations from the lift queue of course!

....and then. When we thought it couldnt get any better a lone figure appeared on top of the ridge - away from any obvious line down - or so I thought - he rolled off the top straight into a 40ft drop - landed it perfectly - which is a good thing because he had about half a second before flying off the second 40ft drop at about a hundred mile an hour! Not content with landing those he turned right and jumped between a load of trees - another 40ft+ to arrive at the bottom. Wow.
As you can imagine, the crown went wild again - it was just like being inside a ski movie - and then of course, we got our turn - no big drops for us but sooooo much fun in the deep pow!
:-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D


After an amazing day it was hard to imagine going back to the slopes again the next day but the snow gods had another treat for us - yet another foot of powder !! LOL We couldnt believe out luck - two powder days in a row. Needless to say we had biiiiiiig fun

This pic show the 2 days of snowfall quite well - this is Jon's van - its a big van too - Its a shame I did take of of my car cos you couldnt see the bike rack anymore - it took me about 90mins and lots of help to get it out again!!



The final word on the weekend has to belong to Flute Bowl. At the end of our first day, we used the new lift to head up to the in-bounds back-country skiing of Flute bowl. It took a half hour hike up the ridge but we were rewarded with a whole mountainside covered in untouched 2-3ft powder and not a person in sight.


Did I mention that I like Whistler ;-)

Christmas in Blighty

Well well, has it been a year already? I guess so. After successfully completing my third semester at Kwantlen I headed back to the homeland to spend Christmas and New Year with my friends and family.

It was Mum's birthday on Christmas Day - the big six o.















And I finally got to meet my Sister Jane's new bloke, Mark - seems like a very nice chap. Just to add to the fun over Christmas Lunch he popped the question to Jane - everybody: Awww!















Jane has been pretty busy since I left - found herself a great bloke, AND is expecting her first baby in the spring - and one more time everyone: Awwww!


It wasnt all family though - far from it, I managed to see just about all my dear friends and no less than four bike rides - it was more like a training camp!

Here's Sara studying the info board that explains the background is actually an ancient moated thing - I say "thing" because I cant remember if it was a fort, a settlement or an early Tesco!!? But ancient it is, and moated it was.





This is looking the other way - it's funny how the mud doesnt look so bad in the photos - I guess it wasnt THAT bad but I'm not used to it anymore (mohaahahaha!) ......oh sorry. Am I rubbing it in.....again! ;-)










...and somewhere in Hertford Heath - this bit was the fast downhill of the ride - mainly cos it's been surfaced - I remember when this was unridably muddy before they surfaced it

(yes Sara, I know you're bored reading this)










Muddy bike - thank the lord (well Ed actually) for mud tyres :-D













About a day before I came back I decided to start taking people pictures - it occurs to me now that perhaps I shouldnt have been in them all!!

Anyway, here's my favourtie Welshman, Adrian with the looooong suffering Esther









...see what I mean!


















...Chris wasnt at all sure about having her photo taken in the middle of a cafe in Hertford












...and Pauline thought taking a photo in a garden centre car park was completely ridiculous!












Sara yes I know I said I wouldnt put this on the blog but we both knew I was lying right?










and last but by no means least Holly, Joe and Rich (thats Hols on the left)

Unfortunately I neglected to get any photos of mine or the Fisher family :-( ah well, next time)

Thank you to all my friends and family for making me very welcome despite me leaving them all for Canada. Special thanks to Edwin for loaning me some mud tyres even if you didnt come riding! Sara for sharing the old trails with me just like the old days, Ade & Es for looking after me as always and Ma for putting me up and giving up her car for two weeks!
But extra special thanks to my little sister for making it all possible. Thanks Sis :-D

Weather, Weather and more weather, and oh yes.......Whistler

We've had a lot of weather here lately.

Round One - Rain: Following the amazing summer which lasted into October, we had the wettest November on record. Now you'd think in a city with such a reputation for rain that they'd cope amazingly well with it. Hmm. You'd be wrong. The reservoirs were so full of run-off from the mountains it contaminated the water supply with silt so we had a ban on drinking the water for three weeks. This was accompanied by power outages all over the place which in turn meant the roads were a nightmare - no traffic lights y'see and they do like their traffic lights here!

Round two - Snow: Once all that was almost done with, the weather turned cold and we got a dump of snow, which made most roads impassable on normal tires and saw even more power cuts and what traffic there was pretty much stood still. I think there was about 18in over a weekend. And living as I do on a big hill, I resorted to bussing it to college for the first couple days. That was about three weeks ago and there's still snow lingering.

Round Three - Storms: The latest round was a bit more aggressive with storms off and on for a couple weeks - in a kind of mini-review of the past six weeks, one day I was awoken by heavy rain, the next hail and the next peeked out the curtains to see more snow! Unfortnately though, with the ground so wet combined with high winds, there were a lot of trees down. In fact the highway through Stanley Park (from the Lions Gate Bridge) to downtown had something like 25 trees across the road, cutting off the city from the West Van.


BUT..... the storms did also bring snow. You couldnt ski much on the local mountains because of power cuts but the storms subsided in Whistler on Friday so a bunch of us were up at 5am saturday to get some freshies! :-D


It was still pretty cold -10 to -15 but I had my woolie socks on...





Of course, I was out with the locals (I include Jon in that as he's lived here two years and did do a couple seasons in Alps) so it was off the lift and into the trees!

Now I can ski alright but in 2ft of pow I find it very hard to pick my line - pretty important when you're threading through the trees!






...and its pretty steep (this bit was out of the trees but the photo does show the gradient pretty well)

thats Jon by the way















And again


















and again.....he was the sympathetic one who'd wait for me as I stumbled my way down the powder



















by the end of the day the wind was picking up a bit and to me delight other people were getting tired (I was knackered hours ago!) so we headed down....


....with just a quick stop for coffee (or hot cider in my case) on the way down.



Another brilliant day at Whistler.

Whistler day2 :-]

Yesterday was a last minute thing. Today was the actual trip we planned. Just for a change we went to Whistler ;-)

It was Jon and Michele's (left) first day on snow this year but rumour had it they were pretty good - especially that Guimond bird!







...and the rumours were true!

There were four of us including Rich but I didnt get a photo of him cos he was always too fast and I was always at the back (again!). Wasnt so bad as last week though cos the snow was no more that 18inches deep :-D








As the young whipper-snapper of the group (not to mention being the gnarly boarder gurl), it fell to Michele to rip up the park while us old boys tried not to get too much air under the wood











more breath-taking views (yawn)


Rich was our leader today and he did a great job of taking us all over the mountain. It wasnt without it's moments though - like the mandatory drop in - its funny how you appreciate the versatility of a bike when you're stuck on the edge of a cornice (snow ledge) above a veery steeep run with only one choice - jump!







...and then there was this run which had the choice according to Rich of "going down this [the hard] way which is pretty steep or we could just go around this [the easy] way"....

we went the easy way but notice how steep it looks just after the orange sign.....








CLIFF!!

....can you imagine how steep the hard way was - I'm not sure I want to find out!

that was our last run....a good thing too as I think my adrenalin was running low! But the best was yet to come.

After laughing at these guys - Whistler's answer to sandwich boards - we went back to Rich's mate's parents' condo and jumped in the hot tub for a while -- oh sooooo good!

Thanks to Rich for the guiding, Adrian's parents for use of the condo, and Jon for driving.

Whistler!

Oh it's such a hard life.....

Whistler opened last week so it didnt take us long to line up a quick visit. I was supposed to be writing an essay but SOMEONE talked me into nipping up the road..... oh well if you insist!

Here's Kiyoka in the fantastic snow on Blackcomb





This is Kiyoka and I at the top of Blackcomb showing off our new jackets :-) and Kiyoka, her new skis!

It was a beautiful day. Clear, cold and with lovely soft snow everywhere. Hardly any fresh pow but the whole mountain was covered in the lovely snow so it didnt matter





Here's Kiyoka in action - she skis so fast, you wouldnt believe it - I tried taking a picture of her while we were both skiing and she dropped me - I had to put the camera away and haul down the fall line to catch her! Crazy girl.






but all too soon the day was over and it was time to go :-( here's me with John (Kiyoka's high school friend) before our last run











....photographic proof I couldnt catch the crazy Jap!!













Can't wait 'til I can go back.......