An early end to a great season of skiing

A wonderful new years trip at Rogers Pass,

Maria touring up on a bluebird day

A great group for amazing ski days, L to R, Devin, me Kendall, Cailan, Maria,

Cailan and I at Asulkan Hut looking forward to powder on the way down.

And then it when a bit wrong. A bad landing from a jump at Kicking Horse in Golden. Up until the accident it was a great day with Cailan in mid januray, I love the Purcells and i love hanging out in Golden.

People had mentioned that tech binding dont release as easily at diamir. this was front impact on the tip of the ski and the binding (onyx from G3) didnt release. From now on I wont ski resorts in tech bindings, not with Cailan anyway=)

Below is the rebuild. very glad i landed in great hands in Cranbrook. i was well looked after. Not something I always expect when I live in a country that is not my own. I stopped counting the professionals that helped me. but the biggest thanks go to Cailan, who is x-ski patrol and had me off the mountain before i new what had happened, and Maria who drove for 20hours straight to get me home to Kelowna.

that screw looks suspicious.....

The Cabin

This is a quick blog update from Christmas. above is the 2010 ymir ski group. absolutly amazing to have met such an excited backcountry ski bunch. Below was on our way to ski at the Kootenay Pass, first moose ive seen in Canada.

I spent the last couple of weeks working up at the Mica hydro generation dam north or Revelstoke, below is my new(ish) car with the 500kV switch gear behind. Its pretty cool if you like power generation and transmission.

This is Emmanuel the outrageous french canadian i have just moved in with.

This is his house in Kelowna, not sure if you can see the hot tub on the deck in this picture.

And this is the mighty Cabin, Emmanuel and Chris's ski project. Cailan and I are taking it to rogers pass for new year, pretty excited.

They have built a log burner inside - perfect!

This is Cailan and Devin touring at Kootenay pass - again so great to have friends to skin and ski with.

NeilH in Canada

NeilH came over to BC for 2 weeks to enjoy some of the interior skiing, and hopefully learnt something about powder while he was here. this is Rogers Pass, my favorite place to ski.

Neil ripping it up in the alpine.

Saving money in Glacier Lodge, Rogers Pass, Neil makes mash potato in the coffee machine - yum (ish)
This is me trying to keep up on the up hills

This was our Yurt near Ymir for 4 days, i loved the place
Organised by this lady, Vanessa. An amazing skier and super fun to be with in the backcountry.

Lucy and their lovely puppy Tucker. I had not skied with a dog before this year, but he was lots quicker on the up hils and could easily keep up on the down hills, bounding through the powder.
Emmanuel flying on his teleskis, Arik and Emmanuel carried a paraglider and a speed wing into the yurt, pretty exciting.
So Cailan is the best down hill alpine skier i know and the only person i know who can literally ski on the back of his skis, awesome lad!

Arik is a bit of a Tele machine, here in full swing.

I still haven't really learned how to jump....

New Winter Trips

A friend of a friend lent us a speed wing - fun!

Basically its a small paraglider, Cailan hadnt flown a paraglider before.... but he was keen to try

They are a bit more twitchy than a big wing, this is top of EastPeak - Big white
Finally on skies, i didnt have the confidence to take it down the chutes. fun though.
On another note, while its been a mild and warm winter here in Canada, the UK has been having a marvelous winter. This is a picture stolen from UK Climbing - Anonymous climber on Point5 Gully, north face of Ben Nevis. This year it looks very fat. A climb that i would one day, love to do.

Skiing - Malakwa

Skiing at Malakwa near Sicamous, amazing day. Luckily for us the logging company is still plowing the road. An hour and a half of skinning up and we were on the tops.

The first descent and a slab fractured and propagated the width of the slope carrying one of our group into the trees. it all turned out fine, but it was pretty scary. 8 inches of storm snow on wind slab, at about 30 to 35 deg slid into the thicker trees.

We found safer slopes and the views just got better - Shuswap lake

Amazingly tempting gullies deep in powder, maybe another day

Lucy hiking up

Emmanuel - beautiful telemark turns

A very excited dave looking forward to the down - thanks Emmanuel!

Christmas 09

A great Christmas was spent with Maria's family in Richmond, Vancouver.

Tetrahedron
I met up with great friends for a return trip to the Tet. crap snow, but amazing times and wonderful cabins.








Roger Pass
We rushed back to the interior to find good snow. Maria's first real experience of champain powder, pillow lines and drops. Video is Cailan, a very elegant skier nailing a beautiful fall line.

Avalanche Course
Just before Christmas Maria organised an avalanche course. was really good. we practiced accessing the terrain & conditions and practiced rescues. they were recommending the Avaluator card which seams pretty good. we met some awesome kiwis from chch, i told them to buy Penny's book!

The Avaluator used this ALP TRUTh thing for rating travel....



Avalanches
Recent natural or human triggered avalanche activity
Loading
Recent loading by snow, wind or rain
Path
Is the slope an avalanche path or start zone
Terrain
Is there a terrain trap that increases the consequences of getting caught in an avalanche
Rating
Is the PAF Danger rating Considerable or higher
Unstable snow
Is there any evidence of unstable snow
Thaw instability
Is the snowpack melting due to solar radiation and/or warm temperatures.

Power Mining

We went to Ymir for a w/e of cat skiing,

'that doesnt sound very enviromentally kind of you Dave?' you may ask... fair comment, infact Lucy made a mad rush to check if we were planning to be sking in Caraboo country, as the maps indicated. Luckily they hadnt been seen (or tracks) during the winter. The snowCat that drove us insearcch of poweder was an 8ltr diesel, we used about 200lts in the day. sadley a ski hill may double this amount per machine in one night, and if there is 10 Cats for a resort....eeek

Anyway, super fun w/e. I still dont stay ontop of powerder, and i can land drops....but its fun trying.

We stayed in a fantastically quircky hotel filled with crasy art and insturments. next day we headed to whitewater - fab.