North America's Largest Resort Empty On A Powder Day - Surreal Experience In Whistler

Whistler's tumultuous weather continues unabated! It's been a very wet but mild Autumn here in British Columbia. Whistler Blackcomb resort is recovering from rain we had here a couple weeks back, the lower two thirds of the mountain are a veritable ice rink.

It has to snow point and overnight we got a solid half foot (20cm) of snow that doesn't really belong here. See, here in the Pacific North-West temperatures are generally milder and resorts closer to sea level than our Rocky neighbours. This gives the snow a lot more body than the light 'champagne' powder of the Rockies or Japan, for example. Due to the colder temperatures a lot more snow fell between Whistler and Vancouver, and unbeknownst to us a truck fell in ditch, blocking the highway for the morning.

My senses were instantly peaked arriving at the car park 15 minutes before opening on a powder day and it's empty. This is unheard of. The gondola was operating but there was no-one in a line, a few people picking up tickets, and we were concerned the line up would be snaking through the village and out the back on a powder day.

The gondola drops you off at the same terminus as the Peak 2 Peak, Catskinner and Jersey Cream Chair and again there was nobody there. Very surreal to see what is the most trafficked part of the mountain empty. At this point I was sure the highway must be blocked. We no longer had to worry about looking for powder, it was everywhere. Warm up lap on Easy Out and it's covered in powder; let the high speed floating begin.

A couple more laps around Catskinner and we take a small gamble and head to the alpine access 7th Heaven chairlift early to get in line. This chair is the highest access on the mountain, some amazing terrain and usually the best snow. The chair was already running as we arrived and we got on with a skier from Vancouver who informed he passed an accident after it had happened but before they closed the highway. Confirming our suspicions, we knew it was a race against time before they opened the highway, or word got around town and people dropped whatever they were doing to head up.

Visibility wasn't great, but rarely is on 7th Heaven after a storm. The snow up here made up for it, definitely some of the lightest snow I have experienced in Whistler. The next few laps were our free heli experience; a massive alpine area consisting of hundreds of acres, basically to ourselves. We met up with Andreas for a couple laps, but lost him in the woods (we were in phone contact), met up with Adam and then had Brent superman slide down the mountain head first.

Watching Brent fall halfway down a mountain head first was terrifying, but fortunately he soft snow saved him and he was completely unharmed. After a moments reflection he decided to bring a helmet up the mountain onwards. We dropped off the back of 7th Heaven chair into Glacier zone headed over towards Crystal. Gatecrashed a cliff drop session going down and met some fans of the channel. Everyone around the mountain in such buoyant moods it was great to see.

Then as the cherry on the top, had an untouched run down Crystal with the homies. We were all exhausted at this point (1.30pm), we had been moving as morning, the lack of lift lines and fast cruising speed, lots of laps; mentally and physically we were all pretty exhausted. The ski out has deteriorated recently but with the fresh snow and artificial snow being blown, we decided to give it a go and had the best ski out I've had in a while, powder to the bottom.

The whole thing was one of my most surreal experiences on Whistler Mountain. It reminded us of Japan; super light snow and empty resorts. Of course we gained at the expense of everyone affected by the closure of the highway, which sucks, but us going or not doesn't affect the situation on the highway so we just enjoyed the experience.

I am an advocate for helmets and definitely recommend anyone snowboarding to wear one. Fortunately Brent wasn't hurt from his fall and will be wearing a helmet from now on. Definitely a teachable moment

#powdersnowboarding #snowboardvlog

Видео North America's Largest Resort Empty On A Powder Day - Surreal Experience In Whistler канала Chris Eyres