Matt, Stan and I set off up Blackcomb together on Saturday 15th, while Rich swapped his skis for snow-blades. At the top of Excelerator we found that Crystal Ridge had just opened, so Stan and I left Matt to wait for Rich and raced down to the chair.
We must have been there within five minutes of it opening, as there were no tracks visible on any of the pistes. As we neared the top of the chair we saw people flying down through the fresh snow, much like we had on Christmas Day. This time the lift had been closed for 2 days, during which there had been over a metre of fresh snow so, although the powder wasn't as deep or as light as at Christmas, the runs were in very good condition. The adrenalin was certainly flowing by the time we got off the chair and attached our boards.
For our first run we picked the most vertical of the routes back to the chair: White Light. At the top the snow was great and we flew down, laying out sweeping tracks in the snow behind us. In a couple of sections the run crossed groomed piste, which came as a bit as a surprise then, just as suddenly, we were back in powder and heading on down towards the chair. The snow was as good as any we've ridden since the recent storms. Because of the recent high temperatures the snow on the lower slopes was still heavier than the perfect powder we'd ridden on 7th Heaven just over a week ago, but it was probably the best snow available outside the high Alpine areas, which were yet to open.
On the way back up Stan and I discussed Fraggle Rock but decided it wouldn't get tracked as quickly as the piste, so took a run down Trapline, which offered more good snow but somehow didn't seem to last very long. Back at the top we rode over to Fraggle and both crashed as we tried to ride up the hill. We hiked to the top, then piled down through some lovely deep snow, eventually reaching Crystal Road and descending to the chair through the trees via Riders' Revenge.
We set off to try Ridge Runner next but found the snow to skier's right far too inviting. At the top we traversed as far as we could to the right, finding some huge areas of untouched snow between the trees, then dropped down towards Ridge Runner. I went too low, but was surrounded by great snow, so Stan joined me and we navigated between cliffs then down Outer Limits and back along Blackcomb Glacier Road to Excelerator.
After a hot chocolate break at Glacier Creek we took Jersey Cream chair up and decided to try the wooded area to the left of the chairlift, below Secret Bowl. We set off down the Jersey Cream run then traversed right, around the shoulder hiding Secret Bowl. In the past I'd dropped down between the chairlifts but this time I carried on traversing and eventually found myself above signs for The Bite and Staircase. I rode down across some wide-open powder fields, past the sign, until I was at the top of a cliff overlooking the main piste down from Glacier Express, Glacier Drive. Since Glacier Express had been closed for several days I thought that run would be in good condition but for some reason it was a bit bumpy.
Stan and I met up again in the Jersey Cream queue and tried the same route again, but dropped down The Bite rather than carrying on to Glacier Drive. We continued on past Glacier Creek to Crystal chair, met up with Matt and queued for about 20 minutes. At the top we met Rich in the Crystal Hut settled down for lunch. Stan and I had the famous steak sandwiches which, once again, were outstanding.
Matt was feeling quite tired so decided to ride down to the gondola and download. Stan, Rich and I set off to do another run or two, but after Jersey Cream and a quick race though the snow cross course in the terrain park we changed our plan. Stan rode down to Wizard and Rich and I to the gondola, where we downloaded. We met Matt at the bottom, handed in the hire kit and returned to the Palace.
When Matt and Rich had packed we caught the bus into town and met up with Stan in the Crystal Lounge, where we also bumped into Mike. We met up with Kinga and Josh at Umberto's at 21:00 and had a great meal there - I had an amazing venison steak. After the meal, Matt, Rich and I went to Citta for a drink but none of us stayed awake very long, so we retired home and found Dom, Bob, Ian and Matt L playing golf on the PS2.
Bob and I dropped Matt and Rich off for their bus at about 08:15 on Sunday 16th, then Bob left me at the lifts and took his hired SUV home. I met up with Stan and we went to buy him a new board, to replace the one that was damaged the previous Thursday. The board is the fifth Option Freeplus that we've bought - Bob bought one two years ago, I bought one to replace my damaged Supercharger and raved about it so much that Andy bought one, then I bought another for a Ben and now Stan has one too. The four from this year all look the same and three of them are even the same length! Very confusing...
Stan and I took our identical boards up the Whistler Village Gondola, wondering whether today would be the day that Peak or Harmony opened. Four days ago we'd watched as first Peak and then Harmony were closed by the wind. Since then storms had kept both lifts closed, restricting everyone to the slush on the lower slopes, whilst snowing heavily higher up. We were very aware that the snow on the Alpine lifts would be amazing and were keen not to miss out on it. We spoke to every ski-patroller we saw, gradually learning more about the state of avalanche control, digging out buried huts and signs, etc.
After one run down to Big Red to warm up, we lost our nerve and went to queue at Peak. We decided that we could live without first tracks on Harmony - although the lift normally opens before Peak and there are some great areas there, nothing compares to Peak. We also decided that the lower runs were not going to provide any great excitement, so we wouldn't miss out on too much by queuing. That was at 09:20.
We got a place near the front of the queue and waited. We almost left when we were told it would be at least an hour, but stuck by our original decision, and waited. The queue built up gradually and we all watched with amusement as a few keen skiers and snowboarders set off to climb Shale Slope. The first two did rather disappointing jumps over the cliff by the frozen waterfall but various people dropped off the top of the waterfall itself and received huge cheers from the crowd. Still we waited.
At one point the T-Bars opened and the rear of the queue for Peak ran up the hill to join the new queue. Few of them came back down T-Bar bowl, so we assumed that they were riding down Harmony Bowl even though we could see the chair was closed. And still we waited.
At 11:32 the lift opened, accompanied by another huge cheer. Normally the queues in Whistler are much more polite and ordered than in Europe but on this occasion things weren't quite so controlled, as everyone rushed forward, desperate for first tracks down their favourite piste. Stan and I were on the 15th chair.
At the top we turned hard right, did up our bindings and dropped into Whistler Bowl. The visibility wasn't great at the top and I felt a little tentative to begin with. After a couple of turns, however, my confidence built as I realised how deep and smooth the powder was. Stan and I leapt down the bowl, with the visibility gradually increasing, and headed for the massive post marking the top of Shale Slope.
Forgetting my plan to ride down skier's left, I turned down the slope as soon as possible, riding the extreme right of the slope right next to the avalanche debris from the earlier blasting. The run was going brilliantly until the slope began flattening and I collapsed hopelessly into the snow, in full view of everyone on the chairlift and in the enormous queue. With my tail between my legs I made it back to the lift, met up with Stan and joined the back of the queue.
Word had obviously got out that something special was happening, as the queue was bigger than I've ever seen it. Ski-patrollers were policing the queue beyond the normal barriers, trying to stop people pushing in, but the queue stretched out to double or triple the length of the barriers, with the singles queue reaching back up the hill past the T-Bars towards the Roundhouse.
Luckily the crowd were in good spirits, mainly due to the unbelievable jumps people were doing as they came down towards the queue. More and more people were jumping the waterfall which we'd been impressed by earlier, but further to the right there were some truly awe-inspring jumps. Two 16mm cameras had been set up, so either the cameramen were part of the team or else they just knew that there'd be some impressive jumping.
The jumps had to be seen to be believed. The most impressive were over "Air Jordan", which consists of a 25 foot cliff-drop, followed by a fraction of a second on a 45ยบ hanging snow patch then another 30 foot cliff. Skiers and riders were hurling themselves off it with varying degrees of success, receiving massive cheers when they landed the jumps. The snow was so soft that those who weren't successful seemed to be OK, but later in the day we saw a skier trapped on the snow-patch with only one ski left.
Despite it's size, the queue seemed to be moving fairly quickly and we made it back to the top before too long. This time we were heading for Cockalorum and the West Bowl, one of my favourite runs. Frontier Pass was as inhospitable as ever but, as so often happens, the conditions improved significantly as we dropped down and by the time we reached our route into the bowl, we could see pretty clearly.
Stan opted for the normal Cockalorum route, hoping to jump off the lip into the powder, rather than riding in across the slope like we usually do. I took the path slightly higher up, traversing past the signs warning of cliffs and finding myself looking down a normally inaccessible gully with only one track ahead of me.
The snow in the gully was as dry and soft as anything I've ridden. I surfed down into the main bowl, traversed a little way to avoid some of the tracks from Cockalorum, then raced down trying to avoid the massive chunks of ice and snow left from the avalanche blasting. It was another amazing run, crossing hardly any tracks and managing huge sweeping turns in untouched snow.
We took Big Red back up and wondered what to do. At the top we looked down at the queue for Peak, which hadn't got any smaller since we were last in it. As we stood thinking we heard a lifty telling someone that Harmony was open, so we set off as quickly as possible.
The Harmony queue wasn't nearly as bad as Peak and soon we were on the chair. Looking up to our left, towards Harmony Ridge, we noticed people dropping into a very inviting bowl above Boomer Bowl, down Kaleidescope. We rode down the ridge, wondering which route to take but found ourselves at the top of the Kaleidescope, removing the need for any decision.
We leapt into the bowl, finding snow even better than that on Shale Slope and in the West Bowl. Being an unfamiliar run, it seemed to last much longer. We crossed over a little ridge into Boomer Bowl then were funnelled down towards the chair through the trees to the left of the Gun Barrels. All the way down the snow was light and fluffy, so even in the steep parts between the trees it was possible to keep the speed up.
Back at the bottom we agreed that we'd made an inspired choice and began waiting in a much expanded queue. We followed the ridge again for our second run but rode off to the right through The Glades rather than dropping left down Kaleidescope. The plan had been to aim for the huge drop into the Gun Barrels but I found the snow in The Glades far too tempting and carried on down too low to make it to the Gun Barrels. Instead I found myself dropping down Robertson's, a steep and densely wooded run down to Burnt Stew Trail.
The queue seemed to be even longer when we got back to the chair, so we decided to switch back to Peak, in the hope that the queue there might be shorter. From the top of Harmony we headed for the top of the T-Bars, turned left down into T-Bar bowl and rode down more beautifully soft snow to Peak.
The queue at Peak was still considerable, though shorter than Harmony. As we caught the chair we realised that we were unlikely to manage another lap, as it was 14:30, half an hour before the chair closed. We considered a quick blast down Shale Slope but were worried that the lift might close while we were in the queue, so chose to make do with one more run down Cockalorum.
We took the same routes as before and I watched from high above as Stan dropped successfully off the lip into the Cockalorum gully. I rode across the top of it and down into the next gully, getting a couple of turns in before traversing right across the bowl towards the Christmas Trees. Having crossed further into the bowl this time I had got past a stripe of avalanche debris and was once again looking down on acres of soft powder. Although more people had passed through the bowl by this stage, I had an even better run than earlier in the day. The route in had given me a higher starting position than most people, so at the top there were hardly any tracks, and lower down the snow was soft enough that it didn't feel bumpy even when crossing other peoples' tracks.
Back on Highway 86, we headed down to Big Red then on down Expressway to Olympic Station, where we downloaded. The day had provided some of the best snow conditions we've experienced so far this season and had been well-worth the four day wait! With more snow due every day this week and the temperature predicted to fall, things are looking pretty good... | 
