On Jan 10 I crashed snowboarding and bent my knee sideways, again. It never felt right after I hit a tree mountain biking in Kamloops so I went to get it checked out. After seeing a few different doctors and an MRI scan they decided that my snowboard crash tore my MCL, fractured the top of my tibia, and bruised the bones around my knee. I’ve been going to physio twice a week since and waiting for the ligament and bones to get strong again, which means no snowboarding.

On Sproatt overlooking Blackcomb

I’ve been out snowmobiling, working and playing. I played a bit too hard a couple of days ago and re-sprained my MCL but it only seems minor. In Feb we took a few sleds into the Callaghan and put down some fresh lines. The area we were riding in was a high security area as the Olympics was on. We can use it as our company has tenure but the army thought we might be terrorists I guess. They chased us down in a helicopter and landed to ask us what we were up to. We told them to go away and carried on sledding.

The army wondered what we were up to.

The Olympic flame came right past our house on it’s way into Whistler so I grabbed a picture, not sure where it is right now. I also went to watch the four-man bobsled final which was pretty cool. We could walk up the entire track and watched them race at every corner as we walked back down. We watched the final few runs at the last corner where the sleds were doing over 150kph. The whole time the Olympics was on, the village was pumping. There was big parties every night and work picked up so I earned some extra cash.

Work’s quietened down now so I’ve got another job for some extra cash at a bar in the village. Other than that I’m still resting my knee, probably for a few more weeks, hopefully I’ll get a couple of weeks back on my board before I leave, my flight home is in a moth and a half.

That completes the Feb/March update…

When I meet friends I haven’t seen for a while they ask “what’s new? “, the answer is nothing, I’m still either snowboarding, snowmobiling or partying and it’s not getting boring, if anything it’s getting more fun. I ride almost everyday and guide sled tours a few times a week which is enough to cover rent and bills.

Limbering up on Christmas morning

I spent Christmas morning on the mountain in my red one-piece, then had a massive Christmas dinner with my housemates, followed by beer. New year was totally different to the norm, I worked until 10pm and after that there was another trip up to the Crystal Hut at 6000ft on Blackcomb. I didn’t guide it but we rode up on sleds on some new routes I hadn’t taken before, it took about 8 minutes to climb 4000ft. At the hut we had steak sandwiches and potatoes while the guest all had cheese fondue. At midnight we set off a load of fireworks and then cruised back down to the base. It was the first new year’s day without a hangover for a long time which made for a good days riding on my board.

Pre-dinner picture

Yesterday I met a guy in the gondola who blogs people’s gear on the mountain. He liked my jacket so grabbed a picture of me and put me on his site whatswhistlerwearing.com/?p=3051. Check it out and feel free to leave a comment about how rad I look…

Finally, last night, the snow fell again and I spent 6 hours on the mountain today, only stopping once for a snickers. It’s due to keep falling over the next few days so it should just get better and better. Also it’s warmed up too, during ‘the freeze’ it was getting as low as -20, now it’s around -5, nice and warm…

I’m taking it easy tonight to recharge for tomorrow, I’m driving a jeep down to the city in the morning for work. It turns out jeeps can’t operate in sub-zero temperatures so we’ve got to take our two to be fixed, hopefully I’ll get some ride time on the mountain in the afternoon.

Last night most of the CSA staff did our fondue trip which involves heading up to the Crystal Hut at 6000ft on Blackcombe either on a snowmobile or in a snowcat. I snowmobiled up and ate loads of cheese fondue, there was also a meat fondue and then pie and ice-cream for dessert. Once work gets busy and I start guiding the fondue trips I’ll be eating lots of cheese many times a week.

Adam and Hannah visited for a couple of days in October so I took them up the mountain to check out the views and the glacier. It was cool to catch up.

I’ve started training for snowmobile guiding and spent some time in the snow getting stuck and digging out machines from chest deep powder. I just need to follow a few trips and learn how the winter tours work then I can start earning again.

There’s been a few bears around in the village, trying to find last bits of food before they hibernate. We’ve had them up on our balcony a couple of times, if our patio doors were open I could have touched the bear, it’s cool seeing them close up.

I’m taking it easy on the mountains, I’ll be trying to avoid any major injuries this season, I’m still building up the strength in my leg after crashing into a tree in Kamloops on what turned out to be the last time on my bike this year. Apparently knees don’t like bending sideways. I’ve lasted a week so far boarding so it’s going well. Only 3 lifts are open right now so it’s a bit crowded but on Thursday most of the trails will be open so there will be a lot more variety. I’ve found a few trails that I rode on my bike in the summer and it’s cool going down them on a board.

On the way back from Vancouver we heard that Whistler has had its first proper snow of the season and the tops of the mountains are now all white. I went up to 6oooft today for a tour and had to resist doing a snow angel.

Also, after 3 weeks of searching through adds online and in magazines, I put an add online for accommodation wanted. 8 hours later I got a call and I went and checked the place out tonight with a friend. We took the room and will be spending winter with 9 other people from Australia, America and Quebec. Bring on the winter…

I’ve pretty much been spending my time either working or riding with the occasional night out thrown in for good measure. I’ve got my Class IV driving license since my last update so now I’m fully qualified to work, at last… Work’s still going good, everyone has been saying how quiet it gets between summer and winter, potentially 3 months of nothing, but it’s staying busy enough for me to earn decent money still. Just October and November to go until it gets really busy again. All the staff at work are getting excited about the winter and it’s rubbing off on me, snowmobiling sounds super cool and I’m looking forward to getting back on my snowboard too. As it’s the end of the season now, the owner of the company is organising a two day trip for the staff, he’s called it Al’s Magical Mystery Tour and no-one really knows what the plan is but I’ve heard they’ve all been good before so it should be fun.

The mountain is open for riding until October 12 but the lifts are closing earlier now, I found out by turning up for an evening ride just as the lifts closed at 5pm. There’s a lot of secret trails on the mountain, some that you need to hike up to and I checked out one of those a couple of days ago with a housemate. The trail we rode was called Ride Don’t Slide, I did a bit of both on my way down it, loads of roots, wet rocks and soft mulchy dirt to get over on the way down. I’m kind of looking forward to the bike park closing, I find it hard to stay in when I know I could be riding, and the rest of the time I’m riding ATVs up and down the mountain, my body’s getting worn out…

I was thinking of getting some more physio for my back and shoulders as they’ve been getting achy after a long day of riding or working but at $75 a time I’ve been putting it off. Then I heard about massage students at a local place that do 1 hour sessions for $30. It wasn’t physio but it was worth a go. I booked a session and turned up at this posh spa place, they offered me tea while I waited which I took but it was weird herbal tea stuff. Then I went into the room and the massage table had a full on duvet on it and the woman told me to get under the covers. I guess this is all normal spa stuff but pretty weird for me. She then went around the table uncovering bits of me and rubbing them, before covering them back up again. There was also one of those relaxing CDs playing with ocean sounds and birds singing. She did some work on my shoulders trying to get rid of the knots but they were to hardcore for her, her tutor came and helped too. Then I got a weird head massage thing and I was done. I might go back for another session, I think I had some good stuff for them to practice on.

As the shoulder season is arriving, a lot of the bars are closing down for the couple of months, the only problem is that they have many alcoholic beverages that need using up before they can close. They sell them of very cheap on their final night so there’s been some good nights out recently.

The house I’m staying in the moment isn’t available for the winter so I’ve been looking for another place to stay. Winter’s always hard to find a place in Whistler and with the Olympics coming it’s extra tough. I must have phoned and emailed 50 people so far but nothing yet, most of the time the rent will go up loads for the main winter months, the place isn’t available for February (olympics) or it’s already been taken. Every Thursday a paper comes out with accommodation listed in it, by Thursday lunchtime many places have gone so you’ve got to be quick.

Hopefully by my next update I’ll have somewhere sorted. I’ll get some pictures up soon too.

Steve out.

Since my last post I worked 60 hours in 5 days which made me really tired, that included a 20 hour day from 8am till 4am the next day. As well as a full day of trips we had a party at our base promoting the company which a load of other local companies were invited to. I was driving bus loads of people up and down the mountain for 8 hours which was actually pretty cool. I had the full selection of company vehicles to choose from including the bus, van, jeeps and the bosses limo which must have been from the early 90′s. After those 5 days of work I had 3 off in a row which was sweet, I did a lot of sleeping.

My back’s pretty good now and I’ve finished my physio sessions, the muscles still get a bit tired after a long days riding but it doesn’t hurt any more. I’ve managed to avoid crashing too hard since and have only had a couple off days off since due to boo boo’s. One of my fingers swelled up to almost double size for a couple of days which was pretty weird.

So work started getting pretty busy, the weather has been amazing and everything has been going good. It’s been the hottest weather for 30 years and if anything too dry as the bike trails are all getting really loose and sandy. The fire hazards have gone up to extreem which pretty much means you can’t go onto the mountain if you’ve had a strong curry the night before.

There were a few storms a couple of weeks ago, mainly lightning, hardly any rain, which set fire to Blackcombe. There’s been a lot of fires this summer, over 2200 in BC due to the really dry conditions. People had to get evacuated from Pemberton just north of Whistler and a few houses burnt down. The fires on Blackcombe meant that we couldn’t run trips there so we moved to the Callaghan which is the next valley across from Whistler. All guides need to be signed off for the different routes and as the Callaghan trips were only temporary it meant I didn’t work for a week. I tailed a couple of trips which were really cool, we went through an old gold mine and past a lake which we all swam in. It was so hot that everyone was dry by the time the trip was over. A few days ago we had the word that we could run trips on Blackcombe again so I’ve been back at work.

My temporary class IV driving licence that I need for work expired on July 24. The company I’ve been speaking to about getting a full licence said to give them 3 weeks notice, so I phoned them at the begining of July and they said they could only get me a test for August 30. Getting a class IV is pretty hard just because they get booked up so soon. I’m on the waiting list at Whistler where I can use a van from work for the test, if nothing comes up by August 30 then I’ll go down to Vancouver and take the test there. Work are pretty cool about it all, the class IV is just for picking up people from the village so there’s always someone else who can drive for me. I went to Vancouver for a lesson a few days ago. My instructor was a chinese guy called Sonny and part of my lesson included going to Ikea for hotdogs and ice-cream, a very important part of class IV.

Crankworx has just started which runs from August 8-16. It’s a huge mountain bike festival with loads of races and comps running. All the pro riders are here and I’ve spotted a few around the village. The amazing weather pretty much ended as Crankworx started though, so it’s been really overcast and raining all day today. The rain’s good for the fires though and the trails all needed the water to hold them together, it’s just not so good for competing or spectating. Some of the events are live online, check it out here.

So that’s pretty much what’s been going on in the last month. Maybe I’ll do another update within the next month, who knows…