Olympics

The Olympics just wrapped up today with Canada winning the gold medal in Men's Hockey versus the U.S.A. What a way to finish! My brother was at the game through some good fortune (and witchcraft I'm pretty sure.) He's the luckiest guy on the planet I know on this day. He got to witness in person one of the most exciting hockey games of all time. I watched from Pemberton in a room full of old and new friends from both sides of the border (and a Swede.) After the game we visited another home full of new and old friends where we watched the closing ceremonies and shared a fantastic meal.

All in all it was a wonderful Sunday where I got to reflect on the Olympics I had been dreading. I had some pretty big reservations about the games coming to town over the last few years. A big inconvenience was how I perceived it for the most part. Then, when it finally hit two weeks ago and was on... it all worked. Obviously there were bugs to work out at first and things to streamline, but once the whole operation started to chug along it was hard to hate on it. I always thought I'd be out of town during the games, but found myself at home the last 2 weeks. I never went to any of the events, but spent some time in Whistler enjoying the whole atmosphere of the thing and catching up with visiting friends. It was a party. And a good one. The press seemed to focus on the negatives at the start of it all (and it was bit of a rocky ride). When the Canadians started climbing the podium to accept medals everyone got behind them, including me. I had lots of friends and family directly involved with the games. I haven't been able to get any of their reviews yet, but I'm pretty sure no one has any regrets. I'm just so glad we won that game!

Dirksen & Deeper

Josh Dirksen has been hanging with us in Pemberton. He made his way up here after the Mt. Baker Banked Slalom to do some touring and shooting with me for Deeper. We've been battling the clouds until the last few days. Finally some sunshine. Stoked to finally work with Dirksen.

Mt Slalok

We've been touring around the Joffre Lakes this week quite a bit shooting footage for Deeper. The skies finally cleared yesterday and we got a good look at a line we've been eyeballing for a while now - Mt. Slalok. Jonaven & Ryan Daly joined forces (as they've been known to do) to tour up around the Matier Glacier and then up the back of Slalok. Ryan was dealing with some bronchial issues that ended up cutting his climb short about halfway up. Bummer, because there was a ton of snow left to shred after Jonaven dropped the line. About 5 hours from the Upper Joffre Lake to the top and about 2 minutes back down to the lake. Windy all morning, but it eased up right when we needed it to. Check out Jonaven's pics here.

Campbell Icefield Chalet

I spent last week splitboarding in the Rocky Mountains just north of Golden at The Campbell Icefield Chalet. I was part of a group of 8 made up of Jonaven Moore and his family and friends. We flew in on a big Bell 212 on a saturday and quickly set out to explore the new (to us) terrain. The group that was there the week before us numbered 30. They said something about hoping it snowed for us because they had tracked everything out. There were a lot of tracks around, but none where we wanted to ride. Except for the up tracks everywhere - thank you! The weather during the week was mostly cloudy with a little bit of new snow almost every night. The snowpack was super stable throughout the week too. There were also enough pillows and steep tree runs to keep us busy in the low visibility. The last morning dawned with clear skies and let us up into the alpine for one run before it milked out. At the end of the week we were pretty blissed out. We did our own cooking, ate amazing meals with great people and got some great footage for the Deeper project.

Our home for 7 days.

A pillow face we named Happyland!

Happyland from above.

More pillow stacks...

Jonaven in a pretty cool place.

Kelly Schovanek, me & Jonaven.

A room with a view.

Thunder Mountain catching some rare morning light.

The group before us had built a network of igloos and tunnels.

As I was taking this picture with the couloir on the left in the background...

Jonaven was taking this one in the couloir.

This line revealed itself to us for about 20 minutes one afternoon. We never did get the light to get to it.

Happy shot.

Thanks Harry Patterson for putting this one together.

Joffre Lakes

I spent the weekend splitboarding around the Joffre Lakes. The first day was an early with Jonaven and his hounds exploring a pillow zone. The weather was forecast to deteriorate during the day so we planned a route in the trees to avoid flat light in the alpine. The sun stayed out all day and we were in the shade. Always fun to explore a new zone though. Marcos the dog got the line of the day. Sunday was forecast to be clouding over and precip starting in the afternoon so I didn't really plan anything. Of course I slept in and the morning was dawned clear. A few calls were made and I was on the trail with Dave B. and Vanessa before noon. We followed the same route up, but took a different line down. The skies did finally cloud over by the time we dropped in, but the run we chose still had good definition. Glad to be out there again riding new terrain with old friends.

Crystals on the trees around the middle lake.

The rock that shouldn't be there.

Marcos tries to figure it out..

View of the Rohr chute (2nd from left) we did last time we were up the Duffey.

Turtle & Marcos give chase.

Sunday late start with Dave & Vanessa.

Final bootback to the top.

Dave B riding the white.

Liquor Lake

AL Clark's POV camera from the GT memorial noboard race. Check out Jonas' parking spot at the end - wow.

My mom's on Sympatico!

The first webisode of "The Real 2010" is up over at Sympatico.ca. Whistler Creek Productions is producing a series of these during the Vancouver Olympics in February. I helped out with this one (as did my mom), but I'll be out of town for most of Feb. and won't be involved very much with it past this. Part of me wishes I was going to be around for the games, but a bigger part of me is glad I'll be somewhere else. Mom's stoked to be there though.

Check it out here.

GT 2010

This past weekend Trout Lake played host to the 5th Annual Greg Todds Memorial. It's a gathering of Greg's friends and family to remember our buddy and play in the snow together. It's also one of the few snow "events" of the season where you can get a little recharge for your soul. The fastest time of the day went to Young Dave and Skye Sheele won the "Asian Canadian Downhill". Somehow I wound up with the "Hard Charger Award" for trying to find some untracked snow down a stack of pillows up top. After a day of racing in the clearcut it was back to town for a fundraising auction and a whole bunch of good times at the town hall in Trout Lake.

This year's edition was, uh... challenging.

Gary Van Os keeping it all in order.

Stu Andrews loves the mic. All day long.

Young Dave keeping it real.

Gary "Tuttle" Hall and Al Clark.

Tuttle drawing the heats.

Colin Adair & Devun Walsh made it out too.

Hardingham as usual.

Taylor Pearcey with hugs for everyone.

Terje and a slew of shreds were all in the race.

Young Dave does it again.

Al Clark threading the trees.

No caption could do this photo justice.

Noah taking it a little further.

Young Dave accepts his cup .

Skye Sheele takes the Asian Canadian Downhill for 2010.

B getting used to the Hard Charger.

Me and the some Trout Lake bros. Al Clark, Mark Friesen and Skye Sheele.

Gigi took the helmet for some laps.

B checks out Super Dave's Tucker.

Jonas Guinn found his own parking spot... don't ask.

Stu reminding everyone why we're all there. G.T.!!!

See you in T.L. next year.

Video from Transworld