We've had a great week or so, with the three of us back on the slopes together for the first time this year. In the last couple of days the snow has begun to fall again, and the forecast is predicting more snow every day. The only negative point is our continuing landlady problem.
We got the letter to Dawn printed last Wednesday (15th), and delivered it together with a copy of the guide to BC's Residential Tenancy Act and the Act itself. Both made it very clear that a landlord/lady cannot impose rules restricting the access of the tenants or anyone invited by the tenants, and the "no over-night guests" rule was actually quoted as an example of an illegal rule.
We got a phone call from Dawn in the evening, who was amazed that we had investigated the law. She seemed to feel that we'd broken our original agreement which stated that, other than the tenants and their casual guests, no-one would stay in the house. The exact definition of casual guests has never been established, although our legal team agree that anything up to two weeks is casual.
Dawn told Rob that she'd be getting legal advice, but it's unclear why she thinks that should differ from the advice we received. We haven't heard from Dawn since, so have no idea what advice she received or what she plans to do. The only effect of the ongoing battle is that Dawn is refusing to buy any wood for our fire, which isn't the end of the world. We just have to hope she's not about to evict us...
I was up the mountain again on Thursday 16th, back in the role of baby-sitter. This time we headed up to Whistler, and Josh and I were installed in the Roundhouse, with a view over the Emerald Express chair towards 7th Heaven on Blackcomb.
Kinga had brought a fine selection of toys including the old favourites, Mr Duck and Mr Turtle. Unfortunately Josh wasn't interested in toys, and insisted on crawling off across the restaurant at full speed. This wasn't a problem to begin with, as the place was deserted, but at the morning wore on the danger of being crushed by a ski-boot increased, and I had to restrict Josh to our table.
When we got down I had a look in some shops for a new board - my old Supercharger was destroyed in the crash, so I've been looking for a replacement. There's a demo day this Saturday (25th), so I'm hoping to test out a few boards and get one sometime next week.
When we got home we discovered that Andy had gone down to Vancouver to pick up his friend, Jules, so there was just Bob, Curtis and me in the house. We had a prawn curry then watched Spinal Tap on DVD.
Friday 17th was a fairly quiet day, mostly spent chatting on MSN or catching up with the email backlog while Bob and Curtis were up the mountain. In the evening we had another curry (chicken this time) and watched an Eddie Izzard video which Bob had downloaded.
Saturday 18th began early, with some key football matches. First up was Newcastle vs Manchester City, which Newcastle won relatively comfortably. This meant that the second match (Man U vs Chelsea) was hugely important (to the two Chelsea fans I was with, anyway) as a loss for Chelsea would mean that Newcastle overtook them in the table. After going ahead, Chelsea survived OK until the 90th minute, when Man U scored, securing Newcastle's 3rd place in the Premiership.
Matt, Bob and I walked into the village after the football and wandered around a few shops, looking for any great deals on snowboards. Eventually I decided to move on to the gym, and Matt and Bob adjourned to the Amsterdam for a few pints. In the evening Andy turned up with Jules (who presented us with a fondue kit), and we watched a DVD of Sum of all Fears, which was dreadful.
Mack and Amrit arrived on Saturday night, and went up the mountain with Andy and Jules early on Sunday 19th. It was Andy's first day on the mountain since his knee injury, so it was a relief to see him return in one piece. Bob and I had another day off, in preparation for my return on Monday 20th, and spent yet another day emailing, surfing and chatting on MSN, with a trip to gym thrown in. It was my fifth trip to the gym in six days, all of which had gone pretty well, with minimal pain from the ribs.
Finally, Monday 20th arrived. I'd set the date as a target for my return a week or two earlier, and after testing the ribs in the gym they seemed up to it. The doctor had originally said three weeks to mend and another week for the pain to go, but the gym hadn't hurt too much, so on Monday morning I took and anti-inflammatory and headed up Blackcomb with Bob.
According to those returning from the mountain, the snow had been getting progressively worse, so I was quite pleased to discover that the runs were still quite manageable, and were not just ice. After warming up on Wishbone and bumping into Matt, Stan and a group of his mates, we headed over to 7th Heaven for some fast groomed runs down Panorama. From there, we moved on to the Showcase T-bar on the Glacier, before heading down Ridge-Runner via the Crystal Hut to Glacier Creek, where we stopped for lunch.
Andy and Jules came up while we were having lunch, meeting Mike on the way, and the whole group headed up Glacier chair for another run down Ridge-Runner, right to the bottom of the Excelerator chair. We did another loop round the same circuit, then headed down to the Longhorn bar for a celebratory drink. We had decided to have a fondue in the evening so, after another drink in Blacks, Andy and Jules went off to find the necessary cheeses. Bob, Matt and I moved on to the Amsterdam Bar, then finally made it home in time for the fondue, which was fantastic, if a little large!
We all woke up late on Tuesday 21st feeling a little too cheesy for comfort. Eventually we managed to leave the house, and returned to Blackcomb and the same runs as the previous day, concentrating on the Crystal chair area. My confidence was beginning to come back, so when most of the group decided to head home I stayed out for another couple of runs down Rock'n'roll and Ridge-Runner, then a final blast from the top of the Glacier down to the village.
Having reached the bottom I started feeling a bit ill, and after a light session in the gym things got worse, so I ended up going to bed at about 22:30.
We agreed on Tuesday night that we'd have an early start on Wednesday 22nd to make the most of the predicted snow, but when my alarm went off at 07:00 I couldn't really face getting up. At 07:30 I finally dragged myself out of bed, only to find that no-one else had got up either. When I woke Bob, he told me that they'd all gone to bed at 01:00 after yet another round of golf on the PS2, and Andy and Jules had decided to have a lie in, so it was just the two of us who headed over to Blackcomb at 08:15.
When we reached the top of the Excelerator chair, the lightboard showed Glacier hadn't opened, so we headed down to the Crystal chair and had a fantastic run down Rock'n'roll. There were only a few inches of fresh powder, but the slopes were leagues better than the previous day. It was the first powder I'd seen since my comeback, and it improved my confidence hugely: finally I could straight-line the runs, knowing that I'd be able to turn at the end, rather than worrying about hitting an ice-patch like the previous days.
Glacier chair was just opening as we got back to the top of Excelerator, so we took that, then caught the Showcase T-bar up to the top of the glacier. We had a very fast run down the T-bar, then decided to head over into Glacier Bowl, hoping to find some decent powder. Unfortunately the snow was a bit wind-blown, and the crusty snow hadn't been very well covered in places.
The bowl was also in the cloud, so visibility was appalling. Unless you've experienced a white-out, it's hard to imagine: the white of the snow merges into the white of the cloud, and unless there are rocks or other skiers it's impossible to tell where the ground stops and the sky starts. It's also impossible to see any shadows, so you can't tell the gradient of the hill. This makes riding very difficult - I was glad when Bob overtook me, and I could see how steep the slope was from his position. Even this was not foolproof - at one stage I was convinced he was going straight up a hill!
The base of the Glacier Bowl had improved beyond all recognition since my last visit, and we managed to reach the cat-track without too much walking, then sped down to Excelerator. Bob was becoming increasingly unhappy with the speed of his board through the powder on the cat-track, so when we got back up to the Horstman Hut we paused for a break.
It was only 11:00 when we reached the Hut, but I hadn't eaten since lunch the previous day, so we decided to have an early lunch and enjoyed a delicious chicken pie. We called Andy and found that he and Jules were still at the house, then set off to tackle 7th Heaven.
When we saw the cat-track at the top of 7th Heaven we immediately changed our minds, as skiers and snowboarders were hardly moving due to the wind. We decided to head down to the Glacier then on towards Crystal. In the afternoon we met up with Stan and then Mike, and rode the Crystal area - Ridge-Runner and Rock'n'roll.
The increase in confidence caused by the powder meant that I was going a lot faster than the previous days, but the powder was a bit heavy, so it also meant I was falling over a lot more. I spent the afternoon jumping off every bump I could find, with the inevitable confidence that I was rolling down the hill most of the time. This has left me feeling a little bruised, though the ribs don't feel too bad.
More snow is forecast for tonight, and every day that the forecast covers - we're expecting between 10 and 30cm every day between now and Sunday, which should make things even better... | 
