Canada - a gap year

On Driving nearly 5000km, 6 days on a school bus, Going from 10 below to 30 above in 2 days and life in general...

2009-04-02T12:30:00.000-07:00

Well as the title might indicate, i spent a few days (10 precisely) on a mission trip with the church, which was essentially this:

Pile 84 kids onto two school buses for 3 days
Surf in a small town called Carpintiria for a day
Go to a massive Rollercoaster park
Do 3 days work at the Dream Center in Los Angeles, including painting, cleaning up streets, handing out food to poor families and the homeless.
Get back on said school buses
Return to kelowna over 2.5 days

The whole thing was amazing fun, i made loads of new friends, had my first experience of church: bible belt style prosperity extravaganza (it was lame), met some really cool kids who im never going to see again, walked down hollywood boulevard and i could go on...

The whole trip was really challenging, sat on horrendously uncomfy seats with no leg room for 12-15 hours a day is definately, as they/we say over here, a bonding experience. Throw in over 40 of us having some illness that saw us throwing up all over the toilet seat before having to use it very quickly shortly afterwards.

I really cant be bothered to write more, i honestly dont know why but that is the case.

I discovered this really cool country group called Rascal Flatts, which everyone over here listens to. Me... country music... they said it would never happen.

Guess i really am going native!

On Riding Park, Fun Fridays and Playing Call of Duty Four

2009-03-14T12:15:00.000-07:00

Well, since my last update i have been a busy bee, hanging out with friends and playing call of duty four at PCBang, a gaming internet cafe. I'm actually quite good, and consider the perfect day to be a day of shred up at BW before heading down for a couple of hours of CoD4 with the guys :)

The tuesday's snowboarding with Matt the day after my last update was fantastic, we did some general shredding on the new snow, hitting a fair few black runs before heading over to the park where we discovered the pipe had opened!! Matt was somewhat nervous, as he had never ridden pipe before. First time down i showed him how it was done, second time down he was better than me! *sobs*

I was actually dissapointed with the quality of the pipe, the walls were uneven and soft, with the left wall being much higher and rougher than the right wall. More recently the pipe has got even worse, as after the last snowfall the careless basher left a 6 inch ledge near the bottom of the left wall when clearing it out. Grrrr....

Matt on the pipe:

We then hit the rails in the small section and i managed to do every rail in the section without sketching, something that i was very pleased of, as its a major milestone of improvement in my riding technique :) With that out of the way, we moved onto some larger rails, including a handrail that is rather hard...

Since then i have tried picnic benches, quarterpipes, and large graded jumps :)

Me on some (very) easy rails: (dont know what i was trying with the 90 degree turns off them...)

On friday last week a bunch of us interns went riding, pushing it really hard for the entire day. I popped my first perfect 180 off a jump, while the others attempted 360s and backflips off the same jump. Having been thoroughly shown how to do jumps, it was mine and matt's turn to show the others how to do rails, including the aforementioned tricky handrail. I tried a large box rail that was designed so you can actually do some sweet tricks coming off it as you get so much air (smooth indy grab for moi!). Unfortunately noone got any photos of that one :(

Adam does a boardpress

The crazy brit!

Jordan grabs some Serious Air

Nate taps a large rail

Matt out-does jordan on the large air...

Yours truly taps a handrail!

Youth this week consisted of gaming at pc bang for the older group (net score for the evening: 200 kills 40 deaths for me :) ) and making a massive pile of cargo pallets and cardboard, soaking it in 10 litres of gas and throwing a match for younger youth. That was quite the fire :)

Thursday was spent riding at a relaxed pace, trying the odd rail, mainly just working on keeping that back straight and riding in switch, both of which i noticed improvement on :)

Yesterday (friday) i went up to biggy with Brandon, one of the youth leaders. We were shredding all day, me on his 132cm forum park board, which is actually a kid's snowboard, but works fantastically for park stuff. I found rails to feel far more solid on this thing than my rome snowboard, and i can pop four 180's in a row without thinking about it. Tail/Nose presses are far easier, and i can use them to pivot into other tricks now. When Brandon announced that he was wanting to sell it, i bought it off him for 50 bucks, an absolute bargain that makes park far easier and funner!

The only problem with the board is that when turning hard it cant hold, and is useless for carving, meaning my other board still owns when it comes to shredding the hill :)

As you can probably see from the above photos, i waxed both boards last night :)

On Hip Hop, Leather Seats and Automatic Transmission

2009-03-02T21:08:00.000-08:00

Well in the (just over a) week since i last updated, many things have happened, mostly good, but some bad.

Firstly the setup began for rush, the challenge of turning a farm/estate and a riding school into a harvest like venue for 1200 (potentially 2000) kids was a massive undertaking starting on tuesday. We started with a bare scaffold, added cloth to make it into a stage, brought in 1300 chairs, set up half of them, brought in bleachers and benches, set up two gazebos, and went home. Wednesday and thursday saw more of the same, with the added excitement of setting up lights, speakers and the desks to run both. Friday 4pm saw 90% of stuff ready to go, giving us some respite to grab some food and test before 6, when the youth started to arrive. Sure enough, half an hour late at 2130 the evenings events kicked off, with over 1700 youth packed into this riding school tent thingy...

All we had to do all evening was act as a mix of security, host and worker, set off fireworks in the box and drive a sweet guy called riley armstrong around.

Saturday saw me paintballing, go karting and laser tagging, all of which were very fun. The most entertaining of the 3 activities was hard to decide, while paintballing saw me only die once in half an hour's game, lasertag was conducted with weapons that had red dot sights, a far greater challenge requiring serious accuracy :) Saturday evening was spent listening to Fresh IE, a canadian hip hop artist, who is so good that i bought his latest album (yes, i now own a rap album)

Sunday saw the final event in the morning,

and then a hurried tidy away after running riley to the airport. It took 40 of us 3 hours and 6 of us one day to dismantle 5 days setup effort!

Monday was spent - as mentioned above - tidying away...

The really good news is that i bought a new car, a 97 Legacy Outback Limited, the top end variant of the first car! This one comes in white, with alloy wheels, heated leather seats, electric windows and central locking...

As we say over here: "Ooohhhhh Yeaaahhhhhh!!!" Unfortunately it is an AT vehicle, meaning i have been getting used to driving with one foot and one hand :P

Just a joke dad, when drifti-sorry, driving, i use both hands :) Its a very laid back experience, just letting the car do all the work for you when it comes to gears. And stamping your foot to the floor makes the most amazing sound and (a small lag later) a massive burst of acceleration as the car drops 2 gears and flies!

Unfortunately, less than 24 hours after getting this car i was pulled over by a policeman for drifing around a corner in the middle of nowhere in the snow. He decided to land me with two offenses - "failure to keep right" and "speed relating to conditions", resulting in a total fine of 276 bucks. I do however get 50 bucks off this if i pay within 30 days.

I have been informed since then that cops in BC have quotas of arrests and tickets that they must meet each year, and that meeting these targets gets them potentially up to 10 grand in bonus pay. I am by this system as it simply means that every month one night will see hundreds of cops out on the streets of Kelowna just looking for the slightest thing to catch people out on. Whatever happened to the lovely country i thought i was staying in?

However, i am going snowboarding tomorrow, so all is well :)

Loves,

Dave

Have some random pics of burgers and sunsets

On Hot Waxing

2009-02-22T14:50:00.000-08:00

Well, as the title my indicate i decided it was time to give my board a bit of a service, in the form of a new surface. So droll...

I bought Ptex and Wax, removed the bindings and set to work...

The first thing to do is scrub the board down with alcohol, this removes any dirt left. Then i filled the the deep cuts (like this one)

With P-tex, a brand polythene designed for boards. The next stage was to take the large block of "Big Bertha" snowboarding wax:

and melt it all over the board, before ironing it in like so:

And then scraping the excess off, leaving me with a horrifyingly fast snowboard, which is hardly a bad thing.

Cleanup is fun too:

For old times sake i found this world industries board:

And took this photo of the top of the cliff (the easy side, these runs are single diamonds, and the pic doesnt really do them justice)

On friday i headed up to the slopes alone, and spent the day just crusing, 180ing into switch and attempting to reverse the process, attempting backside 180s, and hitting rails and some medium/large jumps! Yes, it is official, i have moved up a size in jumps in the park!

My aim over the next two weeks is to get a grasp of the rails in the beginner section, so that i can slide down them all in one go, before trying out a medium classed handrail (thats a rail 1.5 inches wide) in the new section of the park. I have also found that rotating on rails to prevent fall off is coming naturally, something i am rather proud of :)

Next update should contain some decent park vids!!

Loves!!

Dave

On Rippin' It Hardcore

2009-02-15T23:53:00.001-08:00

Well the last few days have seen some serious advances in my boarding skill. Friday saw me riding with Jeff - a local sponsored rider who is insane - and a friend of his - equally insane - through tree runs for the entire day.

Well, i say the entire day but i mean late morning to mid afternoon, the early morning being spent fixing someone's broken hot water pump up at BW, a fun little electrical engineering challenge :)

The riding was intense, and saw me jumping off everything that i could possibly grab some air off, boardsliding a small log and dropping some pretty scary drops, rollers and berms. I also took the opportunity to practise popping out 180 spins in the air, something which is actually surprisingly easy :)

Jeff ready to rock and ruin:

Jeff pulling a handplant:

Getting air:

Tim and I

Friday night we relaxed at Jon & Tanya's, spent some time with the dogs (Pablo is at least four inches longer than he was when i arrived here)

And played with Kai's nerf pistol (something that - as most of you will know - has massive appeal to me, i mean, look at it!!)

Saturday saw me up on the slopes again with a friend from YG and her family. The astute amongst you will note that the saturday in question was in fact Valentines Day, and i was in fact invited up by her as "something to do on valentines day". The people of this country have no grasp of the rules! What happened to the guy being the one doing the asking for numbers/out/email address and being the one who calls? Mental...

We rode hard once again, (Me, Joelene and her brother Joshua) and were immensely surprised to discover we are all at the same level of skill, resulting in some fantastic times had off piste, in the park and elsewhere. After they left i stayed on, as Laurie & Sarah had been at a wedding, the reception of which involved snow tubing at BW, meaning i could hang out all evening. I had some food to eat, hung out for a while and then headed up the hill at 6pm to do some jumps in the park and watch the Rail Jam Competition. Videos are on facebook!

On this day this video was also taken of me:

So all in all, its been a good week! ICBC payed out more than i paid for my car, meaning by writing my car off i have made 466 bucks :)

And we have been blowing up microwaves and stuff at youth:

That is the remains of a 2L coke bottle after it has been used for a dry ice bomb :)

And i took this photo of a squirrel!

On DDB's - A Miscellany of items

2009-02-08T00:24:00.000-08:00

There's a lot to report since my last blog entry, so i might s well start in order:

I received news on Monday that my car was in fact a write off. This was a great shame, as it was a fantastic car. So without further ado i set to looking for new cars.

Tuesday saw the youth team searching for parts for a "teddy cannon" We found them in 4 inch diameter PVC pipe, which we promptly bought, along with an end cap and some teddies:

Down the barrel of the beast

When fired on Wednesday night (redneck night at youth - trailer parties, root bear, sunflower seed spitting contests, fireworks in cars, teddy catapulting from the top of cars) this device produced enough kick to star a car windscreen and severely dent the roof. Its also worth mentioning the accompanying noise of enough dry ice to make 10 litres of gas rupturing a coke bottle sounded not dissimilar to a target rifle, and had the similar effect of leaving the ears ringing.

The bear took over 15 seconds to return to earth, and landed minus a head.

Small groups on thursday saw us hurling dry ice bombs and having a fork lift truck pallet bonfire in the middle of nowhere :)

Some of the youth with me. Well, one ginger one anyway...

Friday saw my first bus trip up to BW (written off car remember?) and the first day i spent carving virgin powder. Although it was very windy, with visibilty touching 100m in places the quality of the snow on the black runs was unreal, especially as i was first down some of them. I then headed over to a really tight mogul run underneath a chairlift, a run which i did 4 times, getting faster and more confident at riding moguls each time. For those not in the know, these are moguls:
Mogul Research

That research really is fascinating, just discovered it!

I then took a few runs to have a go at my switch riding (which is slowly improving) before heading to telus park, where i discovered a spine obstacle had been constructed. Having hit one of the beginner jumps (which had far more pop than the last time i hit it, resulting in a scary amount of air) I tried the spine. It was fun, and i look forward to mastering some basic moves off it (going up the kicker, rolling clockwise as i look down the hill and landing on the vert of the spine, carving back down it - effectively dropping into a half pipe)

I took these pics when i got back to black mountain bus stop:

Today i headed up to BW again, but for a much shorter half day (muscles were dead after yesterday) However i took advantage of the perfect conditions (1 cm of new snow overnight on yesterdays fall, sunshine, no wind) to try something new. My first DDB, or Double Diamond Black run. Words cannot convey just how terrifying sliding towards a lip is to discover that the slope you will be riding drops the first 100 vertical metres in a total of less than 25 horizontal metres. I could literally sit down on the slope by digging my board into a large lump of snow and leaning backwards 6 inches - at which point my backside rested on the slope. But to quote the skier who went down ahead of me:

"Dude, that first turn is f*cking terrifying, after that it gets easier each turn you put in"

Indeed, willing myself to turn downhill and feel myself practically accelerate in freefall was unbelievably exhilarating. In fact, the second turn was even better. And the third. Before i knew what was happening i had reached the bottom of "The cliff" as it is called. Screw the wall of death, The cliff was actually terrifying!

Thighs burning, i met up with Jon n Tanya for lunch, before heading back home to have a few drinks and watch heroes on t'internet (season two is finished, season 3 is started now, soon ill have caught up with the actual broadcasts!!). Riding back down to the car park was a very laid back affair, wearing a long sleeved tshirt, wrist guards and casually drinking coke as i rode:

Its a board bums life....

On getting into the study to write this (5 hours ago) i discovered Mr Beetle (over an inch long from carapace tip to tail), who now resides on the porch step in 20 below plus windchill. He's probably dead by now...

On High Speed Loss of Control

2009-01-31T17:09:00.000-08:00

Well, it happened last year and its happpened again. I lost control at high speed.

Last year it was my arm, this year its my car :(

Yes, Alice is broken :(

I had had a very happy day at the BW (had hit a few of the medium sized Rails and Boxes) when i was going a bit too fast around a corner and lost control. a few skids and over-corrections later and i hit the side of a pickup truck, tearing the front of Alice to shreds...

Hopefully it isnt a write off, and thank the lord i got Collision insurance!

On self taught skiing

2009-01-26T18:35:00.000-08:00

They said it would never happen.

And it did.

We now have a black US President. Joking aside, i did learn to Ski in two hours flat today. I decided on friday that it would be fun to learn to ski. So when i was at Jon & Tanya's on saturday afternoon i mentioned i was going to rent some skis, at which point Tanya said i should see if her ski's fitted me. The answer was they did, so sunday evening i went around to their place and tried on her boots. They were a perfect fit. I tried the ski. Again, perfect. In fact, i didnt even need to adjust the binding strength which saved me some cash!

Monday morning saw me driving to the hill with twice as much kit as normal. The reason: Skis, skiboots and poles weigh a tonne! On getting to BW i strapped on my boots and stood up. I then discovered that you cannot walk on sheet ice wearing ski boots, so off cam the boots, back on went the trainers and i walked over to the lodge. Getting changed there, i was greeted by the sight of several topless Aussie lads all wearing the Australian flag. It was of course, Australia Day, a national bank holiday that some call invasion day in Australia.

Inebriated convict-descendants

I headed over to the bunny slope (beginner slope in european parlance) and popped the skis on. To this point my entire knowledge of skiing was thus: In my Uncle's eyes it was better than snowboarding ever could be; That one leant on the outside ski to turn, and that you lean forward to stay in control. 10 slippery minutes later, i was at the bottom of the learner slope having discovered how agonising one long snowplow can be.

45 minutes later i started to attempt parallel turns, but they just weren't working. I couldnt get the ski's to slide sideways to slow me down. On the cable car up to the village i asked the old ladies opposite me how to slow down when parallel turning, and they gave me the answer! Now armed with the knowledge i needed to take on a Green Run, i headed uphill!

The new pose photo, complete with new shirt!

2 hours and several freezing and painful wipeouts later (i was simply wearing a t-shirt at this point) i decided enough was enough, and bought myself a long sleeved shirt to protect my elbows, which were raw by this point. Two more runs and i headed home, deciding that enough was enough. The second i got home i turned around and went out swimming (sitting in the hot tub - i was tired!) and then came home to write this. A meal of salmon awaits!

My initial impression of skiing is that it is practically impossible to fall over until you start trying parallel turns at a bit of speed. Having spent collectively 6 weeks now honing my sense of balance on a snowboard it was unbelievable to be able to stop myself falling left and right by virtue of having my legs on separate planks but also to be unable to fall forwards and backwards due to the very long skis! Chairlifts and t-bars are ridiculously easy to use, and parallel turning feels somewhat like a very elegant dance, moving from one foot to the other and the skis responding almost instantly. Of course a board responds instantly, but not in the same way. Turning a snowboard is a bit of a black art, there are at least 4 commonly used methods to teach linked turns on a board, skis just require weight on one foot or the other!

However, i dont like having to control which way my feet point, making sure the ski's dont cross (your in serious trouble if this happens at any speed), and i definitely do not like having to stagger back up the slope and pick up my skis when i fall.

On freestyle techniques, riding at 20 below and looking cool.

2009-01-24T18:56:00.000-08:00

The honest truth is that all three are doable at once. The only one that seriously requires work on the mountain is the freestyle skills. Its more a case of confidence than anything. These guys have more of it than you can threaten with a nuke:

Telus Park Pros

I spent the first 2 hours of my day working on riding switch - a most successful venture that saw me riding with awful technique but at least getting the turns in. I found that it really hurt having all my muscles stressed in the opposite direction to what they've been used to the last few days. After getting very bored of trying this out i headed over to the park to try a few jumps and rails. On the way i saw a good view and a vertical solar column triggered by ice particles:

I rode through the park twice, having a look at the obstacles i wanted to try. I then started small, with a couple of little kickers. Shortly after i started trying a few of the rails, all of these very much "Small" terrain features as rated by the system. The rails are extremely hard to fail if you go at them straight and with any kind of speed, and so hopefully i will be moving upto some medium rails next time im at the park, if i have someone to show me how its done... Its pretty much a confidence thing.

Its probably worth noting mum and dad that the ramps and rails in the above video are classed as extra large.

I then returned to gem lake on the opposite side of the resort where i was parked, took the ultimate lets annoy people myspace pose photo

and drove back to Jon and Tanya's place, where we drank hot cider, i sharpened Tanya and Kai's snowboard edges and finished off the day with a relaxational time in the hot-tub.

Cruzin'

2009-01-23T09:53:00.001-08:00

Just some shots of the countryside around kelowna and big white for you today, most of them taken while i was driving, hence the title.

News came today that the family can't join me out here over easter, which is a massive shame. They wont see no lovely snow, snow driving, the car (which has been named "Alice" by the Beth) nor the guys im hanging out with. Nevermind....

The snow is getting a bit bare up the hill, its still serviceable but the current consensus is that its going to be sheet ice. the reasoning for this is as follows: It hasnt snowed in a long time, and its been melting the last few days. Its 13 below right about now, so its going to be nasty. Still heading up there this evening for some night riding with the youthgroup though! Some of the higher runs have reached the point of vegetation and rock starting to poke through, which is really bad for the snowboard. So when it snows ill be back up there with a veangance!

Youthgroup wasnt as insane this week, however i was dragged on stage in front of 500 15-18 year olds and introduced, forced to say tomato a few times and then interview a series of people. Joel (the youth leader) decided to add to the hilarity of the moment by making comments when the girls i interviewed were my age, we both ended up cracking up on stage :)

In other news im really starting to miss home, as much as im loving life here, its not you guys. Im sure there will be some good catching up to do when i get back!

Pics:

Theres a forest under that...

About halfway down the mountain you can actually see trees...

Panoramic mountain!

The road down to highway 33

Pablo gets his sleep on!

A night of 20 below does that to your car...

A Real West Coast Lumberjack

2009-01-16T11:35:00.000-08:00

Well i have my car :):)

Tis a 98 Subaru Legacy and a fantastic car! I have had fun sliding around corners at 40mph on snow so far, apparently it really gets fun once serious snow starts to fall!

Spent yesterday morning chopping wood, earning the title of "Real West Coast Lumberjack" It was immense fun, but very hard work.

Me and Andrew with our steel :P

Action shot!
After that i drove into town to help get youthgroup ready. This consisted of pulling a massive ramp weighing over 200 kilograms in snow and wood out of 2 foot of snow, dragging it 500 meters and setting it up in a car park, Assembling a trampoline frame and soaking it in oil and petrol and then having a meeting. The youth arrived at 7pm and we got through two hours of:

Jumping cars through burning hoops
Setting fireworks off in a box
Having Firework Wars (dressed as transformers)
Driving through the youthgroup in a chevvy truck playing live heavy metal on the back

Amongst other things...

Today is a clear, blue, cold day, and i am about to hop in the Legacy (shortly to be named by Beth) and head on up to the slopes for some riding!

...The son doth shine and the moon doth glow...

2009-01-12T18:13:00.000-08:00

The sun shone for the first time today, prompting me to take a few photos when i got back from town.

But first, sundays activities!

Church in the morning was a different experience to any previous. Held in a nightclub, 90% of the congregation are homeless and/or recovering from some addiction or other, making it very emotionally challenging and draining. Pablo decided the best course of action was to fall asleep, once again assuming the "i got shot - quick! - legs in the air! pose"

After clearing up i went for lunch at a burger restaurant with Matt and a few of the youth interns. We had a good laugh, discussing a plan to build an armoured glass tank to contain fireworks, 20 of which would be set off at once indoors. The burgers came, and were eaten, the drinks were drunk, refilled, chips were eaten and refilled, and this madcap scheme moved nearer to reality with a series of calls to people who could source us armoured glass...

Matt then drove me home, stopping at the bottom of highway 33 to let me drive up to the house. We were in a ford escort estate, front wheel drive, summer tires. I have never had so much fun getting nowhere due to snow and wheelspin! Once enough speed had been gathered, it was possible to drift around corners. Now this is not illegal in canada, as insurance works by insuring the car not the driver. This means anyone can drive your car if they fit into your category of insurance.

That evening saw us go snowtubing, a rather tame affair compared to the insane danger of snowtubing in europe. Essentially, one sits on a large innertube and slides down an icy slope, head first, feet first or spinning.

Today i went to a reputable used car dealer, where i looked at three cars, the afformentioned Subaru Legacy Outback, The Ford Explorer and the GMC Safari.

After short consideration, i decided to test drive the Outback and the Safari. Taking the outback first, the salesmen, a brit with a canadian accent, drove it through the various conditions i would meet - wet road, snow, ice and slush. With winter tires and a manual gear box putting your foot down on ice was a trememdous experience, the car accelerating hard.

Next was the Safari, a box van built on a chevrolet half tonne truck chassis. It was solid, had more grip than the Subaru, but was slower to stop. It was also an auto, forcing me to get used to the concept of just two pedals. Half the fun is taken out of driving as one simply takes his foot off the brake and presses the accelerator to pull away, no choice as to how hard you pull away at all.

With the kids now going insane in the car (for they were tired) it was time to head home. I have decided to go for the Subaru, its a manual 5 speed, its low, its cool :)

Sorry if some canadianisms start slipping in, i mean, i am surrounded by them!

This evening we used the hot tub, apparently in a rather calm fashion. We sat in steaming water outside, breathing in crisp air as the sun set. I am told however, that the way to use the hot tub is wait until it is 20 below and blizzarding, at which point one simply pours a glass of fireball cinnamon whisky, rolls in the powder for a bit and hops in. I look forward to it, especially after a day on the slopes!

Hitting the slopes

2009-01-10T23:05:00.000-08:00

Well, today was the first day on the slopes, more on that later.

Pablo - a golden retriever/lab cross with a bit of husky. Awwwww

Yesterday saw the first "trial" of the snowboard, with a brief slither down the drive. It didnt work at all, something which i found highly amusing. After sledging with the kids, we had dinner with the neighbours, a fun evening with a chance to meet some "proper" canadians. Videos on youtube ensued, and we all had a good time watching such classics as "Bear versus Carribou", "40lbs of Tannerite", "Tannerite and gasoline meets old fridge" and so on and so forth.

Unfortunately, we did not watch powerthirst.

So this morning i woke up early (0700, although the kids wake me up every morning clockwork at 0630 running over my room) and dressed for boarding. After loading up on pancakes with maple syrup and coffee we drove to Sarah's brothers house, where i was left with his family. Some more coffee followed, before we threw the kit in the truck and headed up to Big White.

Throwing the stuff in the truck

The drive was amazing, with snow covering the roads and drifts up to 7 or so meters deep (covering mature pine trees in places), the truck fishtailing all over the place.

Upon arrival at BW we headed up to the village to get my pass. Unfortunately, the age of majority in BC is 19, so a parental consent waiver was required. This needs to be posted home, signed and posted back, but Laurie can sign it as my legal guardian, or i could just do a bit of forgery... Either way i was issued with some day passes to cover me until i get that sorted.

Riding to the top of the lift, the pines were cladded in snow, (Apparently they are "snowghosts") weighing the bows down. The forest was completely silent and foggy, adding an almost supernatural feel to the place.

Yours truly wearing a not very nice helmet - one to be bought soon!

Pretty snow!

In canada the runs are not marked out at all, meaning riding through forests is easy and fun to do. Given the lighting conditions however, this was not too wise a move, especially after the fiasco that was my last time on a board.... So we rode down two runs, (excellent snow quality compared to europe, it was nice and dry), i managed not to wipe out a single time! Upon arrival at the top of the village lift i discovered that i had snapped the toestrap of my left binding. I was not particularly happy, and so headed straight to the repair shop to get it sorted. 15 minutes and 21 bucks later and i had a working binding again thanks to some very helpful aussies (who claimed that they invented chicken pie, not the brits?)

A few adjustments were made to the bindings, giving me better responce from the board. It really is a good board, several times i thought i was going to wipeout but i didnt, the board held in there!

After a few more runs, we had lunch (stopping for maple taffy - boil maple syrup and pour it on ice - gorgeous) and then hit the park for one last run before heading home. The park is really cool, and i have set an objective of 180ing onto a rail, boardsliding it and exiting the rail with a 180 by the time i leave - given im not particularly good at rails and have never tried a 180 this is a fair bit ahead of me :)

On arriving home, i discovered that Lauries parents had arrived and gone shopping for appliances, so i promptly had a nap.

The plan for tomorrow and monday is as follows:
Go to church and hang out with some of the guys for lunch and the afternoon, followed by snowtubing in the evening.

Monday i buy my car, one of the following:

2000 Subaru Legacy Outback in dark green, all wheel drive
Ford Explorer SUV
Or a GMC Safari.

At the moment im thinking the Outback because its low and light compared to the other two - ie i wont roll it messing about!

Arrival

2009-01-09T10:53:00.000-08:00

Well im here, and my first impression is definately a good one. After a torturous 13 hour flight (including a 1hr30m refuel on the east coast of canada) i arrived at calgary at 1330 local time. The landing was fantastic, we just dropped through cloud and suddenly the runway appeared 10 meters below us. Everything was white apart form the runway, and it was snowing as we landed.

A short trip through immigration later (they were surprised that it would take me 4 months to snowboard...) i was informed that my next flight was an hour late, giving me four hours to lounge around and listen to music.

The aircraft on landing

I took some photos as the sun shone through, and then listened to more and more music to pass the time until my flight arrived at Calgary (It arrived after it was meant to land in Kelowna!):

Arriving at laurie and sarahs at 1900 (0300 uk time), feeling not at all jetlagged i was greeted with unbridled enthusiasm from their kids and drawings!!!! After they had gone to bed we sat and talked, drank cinnamon whisky and i then went to bed at midnight.

Waking up the next morning we went shopping. Met a guy called Matt, one of the youth worker interns at willow park church (where iwill be working). Ithen bought all the gear i would need except a snowboard, including oakleys goggles, head boots and columbia jacket and trousers :)

Unfortunately, Matt had used up his employee discount, so come feb 1st we are returning and re-buying everything at discounted prices!

We then went for a burger, and i met Jeff, an ex pro snowboarder who had a snowboard for me. After having what laurie claimed was the "Best burger in town", we went to Jeff's place to see his bike, his mates heavily customised MR2 and this snowboard, an 08 Rome board with pro salomon bindings, costing over 1000 dollars new. Jeff was upset to part with the bindings ("the best bindings [he] has ever ridden").

It was time to go home and sort out the bindings (he's goofy, i'm regular)

and adjust stance, before taking the shameless myspace pic!

Some people will no doubt notice what appears to be "Mouldhat". Unfortunately, Mouldhat was lost just before i flew, and so this his replacement, "Mouldhat the second".

So some time in the next few days im gonna get to try it all out, but at the moment im still very much getting everything sorted, car, phone, equipment, youthwork etc etc.

This is gonna be fun :)