As noted, I met up recently with a bunch of people that were heading up to Whistler for a little ski/snowboard trip. Being that they were passing right through Seattle on their way up, there was no way I could pass up an open couch for some great snowboarding. I’d been to Whistler in the summer for some downhill Mountain Biking, but had yet to see it in all its powdery winter glory.

Needless to say, the fluffy white stuff was in abundance.  We arrived Sunday evening and after the ritual waxing of the boards made a (fairly) early night of it.  Then it was out the door by 8am the next morning to hit up Whistler mountain.  Weather conditions weren’t awesome (it was pretty foggy and snowing a little bit) but the great abundance of runs and powder more than made up for it.  My favorite part was when we dropped into one of the bowls.  It was awesome to shoot down the side of that sucker in such beautiful powder.  That was the point where I fell down at one point, got back up and thought to myself: ‘That didn’t hurt…I wonder if…’ and I proceeded to board down a little bit, then throw myself forward and flip off my hands back onto my board.  Despite the fact that I didn’t stay up, it was still awesome and I did it a few more times.  The last run of the day, despite the biting wind, uber-fog, and poor visibility was still a ton of fun and it took us 44 minutes to get back down the mountain.  A quick race back to the condo where I managed to be the first one in the hot tub.  We all (well…most of us hehe) crashed pretty early that night after a full day of boarding…but there was more to come. The next day we were off even earlier to hit up Blackcomb mountain.  I personally like Blackcomb better, as many people did and do.  I felt like I had a little more freedom and the terrain was very appealing.  I could go up to the top of the mountain and bomb through some chutes. Or I could go over to 7th Heaven and disappear into the woods in search of the fluffy white stuff.  Or I could hit the trails over by Crystal chair, which were more of your standard ski trails, but lots of options, lots of terrain, and again the ability to disappear into the woods.  I again hit up the top of the mountain for the last run of the day, which was just amazing.  It was right about then that I was catching my second wind and I was just having a great time carving it up.  As a couple of us were passing a lift to head down to the village, a couple of our crew called out.  The lift was stopped for some reason, so we raced over, hopped on and got in yet another run down the mountain.  And then it was back to the condo for some more relaxing hot tub action.

Then it was time for a little mardi gras action, and after that I unfortunately had to depart the crew to drive back to Seattle and get back to work.  I wish I could have stayed longer, but I know I’ll be back up again soon.  All-in-all, it was an awesome time.  I’m quite happy I moved out to this part of the country.  I’ll be posting a few pics soon.