Kale Stephens

The Living Legends series continues over at Push.ca with Kale Stephens. Check it right here or over there.

WTF?!!

I love hockey games. I love Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals. What the hell do these people have to do with hockey? So absolutely disappointing. Not only do we miss a glorious opportunity, but the morons of the lower mainland decide to give us another black eye. Thanks for coming out you idiots.

Chilean Volcano Goes Off

Surreal pic from the volcanic eruption going on in Chile over the last few days. This is the same volcano Shin, Lucas, Xavier, DCP and crew tackled last summer with splitboards.

There's a good collection of eruption pics here.

P.A. postscript

After the Goat Trip I hung out in P.A. for a couple days. Here's a couple shots from a beautiful evening in the Strait.

Goat Tour Pt 3

The weather changed overnight. Even with ear plugs in I could hear the dreaded drops hitting the tent. We all slowly rose from our warm dry bags to assess the wet day in front of us. The clouds were hanging low and there was a constant drizzle. After getting some coffee and food into us we made our way to the old Tubal Cain mine just above our camp. Four of us went in for a look see. There's dark and then there's absolute dark. We found the later. A little bit creepy would be an understatement.

Forrest and friend.

Yoshida considering the entrance.

I think I just saw Gollum!

We all made it out of the mine without waking any cave demons. It was totally Lord of the Rings in there. The day was drab and gray but we decided to session a patch of snow with a tree jib before we packed it up and moved down the trail.

Temple checks a line. The little guys were always close by.

Lester's puppy Laska.

Let's make it interesting. In run by Blair & Forrest.

Forrest halfway there.

Blair in the air.

After a successful final session it was time to load up and head out. Going downhill should be easier. The goats practically dragged me down the trail. They wanted to get home more than anyone. Except for one of them. One of the bigger goats (Hencho) decided he'd had enough about 2/3's of the way down and went on strike. He almost had the rest of the goats convinced to do the same, but we got them moving again before a mass revolt ensued. After unloading Hencho and securing him to a tasty salal bush we continued down the trail minus one goat. By the time we'd reached the truck, unloaded and gone back up the trail to help Les get Hencho down it was dark. Even after a good rest and being unloaded this goat was not into it. He refused to walk. Blair & Les had got him down the trail as far as they could. Mike and I joined the group and the four of us shouldered the beast and packed him out the rest of the way. That's right - we packed out the pack animal. I swear he was smiling the whole way.

How often do you get to hang with a blue goat?

About halfway down the trail before Hencho's revolt.

Hencho and Les at the end of the trail. I think Les is wondering how H would taste with a nice Shiraz.

What a mission! We were all relieved to be down off the mountain safe and sound. And just like that my snow season was over. Another day of sun would have been nice, but getting 2 in a row this year seems lucky. What a winter!

Goat Tour Pt 2

 So... we woke up to dry skies and got our train headed up the valley to the zone we'd scoped the day before. No goats today. Oh - I forgot to mention we took a couple of the goats into the alpine on Day 1 just for the hell of it. Well, for photos actually. Mountains, goats, snow shredding... you get the picture. Well you will when Yoshida's pics come out next year in the mag. Oh, and we dyed a goat blue too. He was pissed at first but I think he got into it after a while.

Smoky morning.

Break on the trail for...

...gypsy snacks from Forrest.

Blair & Sammy head up. Pic from Temple.

As does Forrest. Pic from Temple.

The mountains are green out here.

Forrest on his ridge. Pic from Temple.

The day went pretty well. The boys all got to tackle a line or two in pretty decent corn snow. The clouds held off. The views were amazing. Everybody came down smiling. Forrest even did a little pond skimming on the way out. We all made our way back to camp to find Pos & Stantech had made their way up the trail. We'd been to the Mervin Factory before we came in and they'd said they were going to try and meet us up there. "Yeah, cool" we said. "Yeah, right" we thought. But there they were - ready for anything. Well not really. It started raining that night and they were gone before we woke up the next morning. Good effort guys.

Yeah, it was a little weird. Pic from Temple.

Check back soon for Day 3.