Posted: Wed Oct 03, 2012 1:46 pm
Day 1
I figured I had it easy for the trip up. It didn’t end up that way though. Flights were all on time, nothing delayed just time consuming. I land in Vancouver, get my bags and look for my shuttle. I had a little time to kill as the bus wasn’t leaving for another 40 minutes. So I get a snack while I’m waiting for the bus to arrive. They finally get everyone loaded on the bus and we head out. The driver mentions it will take 2hr and 45 mins to get there and that we had to pick up a few people in downtown along the way. It shouldn’t take that long but since we had to pick up those people it did. We passed through a not so nice part of Vancouver as some passengers chuckled as they saw a guy dressed up as a girl walking down the street with not much clothing covering him/her/whatever. There was no way I was taking a picture of that. Not something I want to remember if you know what I mean. We make it through the downtown area, pick up some people and head out of Vancouver. It looks like a nice city to explore. It wasn’t a great day at all. It was quite dreary to be honest so no pictures at all.
We continue our journey to Whistler along the Sea to Sky Highway. This has some completely breathtaking views IF the weather had been nice. But it wasn’t. It was dreary and rainy. The drive up was very windy and I’m surprised I didn’t get sick but I thought I was going to a couple of times.
Sitting across from me was a British family on holiday. The 3 kids were behaved for the most part but at the end they were getting very antsy and bickering amongst themselves. One of the girls started fussing and crying. I can’t really blame them. I was tired too and wanted to be there just as bad as they did. That family had been traveling a lot longer than I had so I had no room to whine.
We had a shift in transportation and a shuttle took some of us from the bus to our respective places of lodging. I finally arrive at the condo where I’d be staying for the trip. I noticed when I got off the shuttle that it was snowing so I guess that changed as we were coming up from Vancouver. It was nice to see snow finally this winter. I got all settled in my room but was too tired to wander around the village from all the traveling I had done. So I kept it simple. I went to the grocery store around the corner from here and I couldn’t believe my eyes, it was an “IGA”. Me and IGA go way back to my childhood years in New York. Moving on, I get some basic stuff for the condo and then get some snack wraps from Mickey D’s and head back to the condo. Unfortunately, I had to do some work stuff despite being ridiculously tired. It didn’t take too long to do and so I just got that out of the way. I went to sleep early as the night before I only got 3 hours of sleep in before I got ready and headed out to the airport. I tried to sleep on the plane but just couldn’t make it happen. I woke up a few times in the middle of the night as there was quite a bit of drunken commotion outside at 2 in the morning from all the people leaving the bars. I just put my headphones in and fell back asleep to sounds of the ocean.
Day 2
Today was a day of firsts. I decided to go to Blackcomb Mtn and see what they had to offer. The bus drops you off at the base of Whistler, but there is a gondola that takes you over to Blackcomb and up the mountain a little ways. It was my first time riding in a gondola. It was pretty neat. It beats the chairlift any day.
The weather wasn’t all that great. Visibility was very low so that made getting around the mountain a challenge at certain times. I managed through it though and made the best of it. I stuck to mostly blue runs as I was told that none of the black trails were groomed and were mostly bump out. Another first was for the first time this season getting to ride on real snow in addition to actually seeing snow and riding while its snowing.
I wandered around the mountain picking out a trail here and a trail there to try out. Later in the day I decided to try out some trails at the top of the 7th Heaven lift. The wind was gusting pretty hard when I got to the top but with my new jacket and snow pants it didn’t bother me one bit aside from the very low visibility it causes. Now I was intending to try out a few trails on that side of the mountain but since it was very hard to see where to go I decided to bail and leave that area and head back to where I was before.
I was beat by 2:30 and headed back to the base for some apres at Long horn Saloon. I was going to order a margarita but it was $16…no thanks. I stuck with rum and coke which come to find out was a quarter of the price of the margarita. I’m sure it wasn’t worth $16.
I was able to snap one picture this day aside from all the videos I shot and it was at the end of the day. I’ll put a compilation of that later on down the road.
[IMG]http://josterman.files.wordpress.com/20 ... =590&h=442[/IMG]
Day 3
I wasn’t quite done exploring Blackcomb so I spend another day there. The weather was more clear than it was the day before so I spent the morning on the upper right side of the mountain on the 7th heaven lift. This area I did one run on the day before and decided not to go back because of low visibility. This wasn’t a problem today. Visibility was good and you could actually see where you were going. Low and behold there was lots of powder turns to be had. I rode the lift back up with a father and his sons. I recommended them going to Lakeside bowl which is where most of the freshies were. I hadn’t made it all the way into the bowl on prior runs but I led the way for them to make it over there. Bowls have always been a challenge for me and this one was no exception. As with anything though, the more you practice and work on them, the better you eventually get. I’m getting there, slowly but surely. I used to be scared to death of them because of how steep they are. I can tell my fear of them has weakened slightly. Its a mental thing really. You really have to convince yourself that you CAN do it. Little did I know though that my challenge wasn’t done yet for the day.
After spending a good bit of time riding trails from the 7th heaven lift, I went and had some lunch at one of the mountain top lodges and scoped out what trails I wanted to do for the rest of the day. I know I hadn’t went up the Glacier lift and there was a T-bar that took you to the top of one of the peaks. I hadn’t been on a t-bar lift before and so I made it about 30 or 40 feet before I lost my balance and couldn’t hang on to the lift. I fell and felt really stupid for doing so. I went back and gave it another go. This time it was a success. This was the route to take to get to Blackcomb Glacier. Oh boy! A glacier! Never rode one of those before. Not sure how to really explain it besides it being one big huge bowl. Here is a pic of the sign when you get off the t-bar and walk a little ways.
[IMG]http://josterman.files.wordpress.com/20 ... =590&h=442[/IMG]
From the point of that sign back to the Gondola was 6.7 miles. Another first in the works. If you look to the right of the sign there is a hill that goes up to the cat track over to the glacier. No lifts from here on out. Its boot pack the rest of the way. This is what you call earning your turns. Everyone had taken their skis/boards off and started hiking out to the glacier. This was some tough stuff. I had to stop a few times just to catch my breath. The weather started picking up too and visibility was going from decent to not so decent and back again. I took it easy for awhile as I waited a few minutes for visibility to get a little better.
[IMG]http://josterman.files.wordpress.com/20 ... =590&h=442[/IMG]
This is a view looking back at the cat track from the hike up. I was at a good drop point when I took the picture. If you look closely at the little dots in the middle, those are people starting the hike up to give you an idea of how big of an area this is. The clouds started to lighten and I get ready to start my descent.
[IMG]http://josterman.files.wordpress.com/20 ... =590&h=442[/IMG]
I take it easy going down and followed the trail marker posts to guide me on where to go. I make my way out of the glacier area and look back to take in the beautiful view.
[IMG]http://josterman.files.wordpress.com/20 ... =590&h=442[/IMG]
At this point I was only half way. It was still another 3.2 miles back. At least it was all smooth groomers the rest of the way as my legs were all beat up from the boot pack and the ride down. All I kept thinking to myself was “What was I thinking?”. But thats how you progress. Challenge yourself to bigger things. I made my way back to the village and hit up GLC for some apres ski drinks to celebrate my accomplishment.
I figured I had it easy for the trip up. It didn’t end up that way though. Flights were all on time, nothing delayed just time consuming. I land in Vancouver, get my bags and look for my shuttle. I had a little time to kill as the bus wasn’t leaving for another 40 minutes. So I get a snack while I’m waiting for the bus to arrive. They finally get everyone loaded on the bus and we head out. The driver mentions it will take 2hr and 45 mins to get there and that we had to pick up a few people in downtown along the way. It shouldn’t take that long but since we had to pick up those people it did. We passed through a not so nice part of Vancouver as some passengers chuckled as they saw a guy dressed up as a girl walking down the street with not much clothing covering him/her/whatever. There was no way I was taking a picture of that. Not something I want to remember if you know what I mean. We make it through the downtown area, pick up some people and head out of Vancouver. It looks like a nice city to explore. It wasn’t a great day at all. It was quite dreary to be honest so no pictures at all.
We continue our journey to Whistler along the Sea to Sky Highway. This has some completely breathtaking views IF the weather had been nice. But it wasn’t. It was dreary and rainy. The drive up was very windy and I’m surprised I didn’t get sick but I thought I was going to a couple of times.
Sitting across from me was a British family on holiday. The 3 kids were behaved for the most part but at the end they were getting very antsy and bickering amongst themselves. One of the girls started fussing and crying. I can’t really blame them. I was tired too and wanted to be there just as bad as they did. That family had been traveling a lot longer than I had so I had no room to whine.
We had a shift in transportation and a shuttle took some of us from the bus to our respective places of lodging. I finally arrive at the condo where I’d be staying for the trip. I noticed when I got off the shuttle that it was snowing so I guess that changed as we were coming up from Vancouver. It was nice to see snow finally this winter. I got all settled in my room but was too tired to wander around the village from all the traveling I had done. So I kept it simple. I went to the grocery store around the corner from here and I couldn’t believe my eyes, it was an “IGA”. Me and IGA go way back to my childhood years in New York. Moving on, I get some basic stuff for the condo and then get some snack wraps from Mickey D’s and head back to the condo. Unfortunately, I had to do some work stuff despite being ridiculously tired. It didn’t take too long to do and so I just got that out of the way. I went to sleep early as the night before I only got 3 hours of sleep in before I got ready and headed out to the airport. I tried to sleep on the plane but just couldn’t make it happen. I woke up a few times in the middle of the night as there was quite a bit of drunken commotion outside at 2 in the morning from all the people leaving the bars. I just put my headphones in and fell back asleep to sounds of the ocean.
Day 2
Today was a day of firsts. I decided to go to Blackcomb Mtn and see what they had to offer. The bus drops you off at the base of Whistler, but there is a gondola that takes you over to Blackcomb and up the mountain a little ways. It was my first time riding in a gondola. It was pretty neat. It beats the chairlift any day.
The weather wasn’t all that great. Visibility was very low so that made getting around the mountain a challenge at certain times. I managed through it though and made the best of it. I stuck to mostly blue runs as I was told that none of the black trails were groomed and were mostly bump out. Another first was for the first time this season getting to ride on real snow in addition to actually seeing snow and riding while its snowing.
I wandered around the mountain picking out a trail here and a trail there to try out. Later in the day I decided to try out some trails at the top of the 7th Heaven lift. The wind was gusting pretty hard when I got to the top but with my new jacket and snow pants it didn’t bother me one bit aside from the very low visibility it causes. Now I was intending to try out a few trails on that side of the mountain but since it was very hard to see where to go I decided to bail and leave that area and head back to where I was before.
I was beat by 2:30 and headed back to the base for some apres at Long horn Saloon. I was going to order a margarita but it was $16…no thanks. I stuck with rum and coke which come to find out was a quarter of the price of the margarita. I’m sure it wasn’t worth $16.
I was able to snap one picture this day aside from all the videos I shot and it was at the end of the day. I’ll put a compilation of that later on down the road.
[IMG]http://josterman.files.wordpress.com/20 ... =590&h=442[/IMG]
Day 3
I wasn’t quite done exploring Blackcomb so I spend another day there. The weather was more clear than it was the day before so I spent the morning on the upper right side of the mountain on the 7th heaven lift. This area I did one run on the day before and decided not to go back because of low visibility. This wasn’t a problem today. Visibility was good and you could actually see where you were going. Low and behold there was lots of powder turns to be had. I rode the lift back up with a father and his sons. I recommended them going to Lakeside bowl which is where most of the freshies were. I hadn’t made it all the way into the bowl on prior runs but I led the way for them to make it over there. Bowls have always been a challenge for me and this one was no exception. As with anything though, the more you practice and work on them, the better you eventually get. I’m getting there, slowly but surely. I used to be scared to death of them because of how steep they are. I can tell my fear of them has weakened slightly. Its a mental thing really. You really have to convince yourself that you CAN do it. Little did I know though that my challenge wasn’t done yet for the day.
After spending a good bit of time riding trails from the 7th heaven lift, I went and had some lunch at one of the mountain top lodges and scoped out what trails I wanted to do for the rest of the day. I know I hadn’t went up the Glacier lift and there was a T-bar that took you to the top of one of the peaks. I hadn’t been on a t-bar lift before and so I made it about 30 or 40 feet before I lost my balance and couldn’t hang on to the lift. I fell and felt really stupid for doing so. I went back and gave it another go. This time it was a success. This was the route to take to get to Blackcomb Glacier. Oh boy! A glacier! Never rode one of those before. Not sure how to really explain it besides it being one big huge bowl. Here is a pic of the sign when you get off the t-bar and walk a little ways.
[IMG]http://josterman.files.wordpress.com/20 ... =590&h=442[/IMG]
From the point of that sign back to the Gondola was 6.7 miles. Another first in the works. If you look to the right of the sign there is a hill that goes up to the cat track over to the glacier. No lifts from here on out. Its boot pack the rest of the way. This is what you call earning your turns. Everyone had taken their skis/boards off and started hiking out to the glacier. This was some tough stuff. I had to stop a few times just to catch my breath. The weather started picking up too and visibility was going from decent to not so decent and back again. I took it easy for awhile as I waited a few minutes for visibility to get a little better.
[IMG]http://josterman.files.wordpress.com/20 ... =590&h=442[/IMG]
This is a view looking back at the cat track from the hike up. I was at a good drop point when I took the picture. If you look closely at the little dots in the middle, those are people starting the hike up to give you an idea of how big of an area this is. The clouds started to lighten and I get ready to start my descent.
[IMG]http://josterman.files.wordpress.com/20 ... =590&h=442[/IMG]
I take it easy going down and followed the trail marker posts to guide me on where to go. I make my way out of the glacier area and look back to take in the beautiful view.
[IMG]http://josterman.files.wordpress.com/20 ... =590&h=442[/IMG]
At this point I was only half way. It was still another 3.2 miles back. At least it was all smooth groomers the rest of the way as my legs were all beat up from the boot pack and the ride down. All I kept thinking to myself was “What was I thinking?”. But thats how you progress. Challenge yourself to bigger things. I made my way back to the village and hit up GLC for some apres ski drinks to celebrate my accomplishment.
