takeahike46er
Well-known member
- Joined
- Sep 21, 2020
Doesn’t every avid skier who lives in the Northeast, at some point, dream of living out west?
I certainly did. But I never truly considered moving away from New York until the past couple of years. The thought of moving was always stunted by practical matters—things like family, friends and careers. “I could never live out there”, I always told myself. And so I didn’t.
That all changed when I married a Canadian. When it came time to decide where to live and build a life together, we were both aligned on BC.
To be honest, despite all the superlatives used to describe Whistler, it was never at the top of my list of places to visit. I knew the skiing was world-class, but I was always more eager to check out other less visited ski destinations. You know, places that don’t get something like 1.1 million skiers per season. Now that I’ve moved to the Vancouver area, it’s not only at the top of my list—but with Covid—it practically IS my list.
It turned out that my suspicions about Whistler were correct. I expected the full corral for the Blackcomb Gondola that Saturday morning. But when I tried to enter what I thought was the line, a worker stopped me in my tracks and said, “The line starts back there”—as he pointed far in the opposite direction. The line for the gondola, which I could not yet take in the scale of, wrapped around the equivalent of a city block, eventually dividing into two—before merging back into the corral. My jaw nearly dropped.
This certainly wasn’t what I envisioned when I dreamt of moving west. An hour and ten minutes line to board a lift? Thankfully, once I finally made it up the hill, I found soft trails from a modest storm the day before.
My plan was to stick to the Blackcomb side and get acquainted with that side of the mountain—taking it easy since the recent move had robbed me of any chance to ski this season. With some groomer runs now under my belt, I eventually settled into laps on the Glacier Express chair, where runs like Blowdown were a standout.
The next day, I vowed to get in the lineup for the chair early. As I made my way through the village, the only signs of life at 7:30 AM were the scraping sounds of snow removal clearing the few inches of snow that fell overnight. Otherwise, it was dead quiet.
Imagine my reaction when I turned the corner to suddenly see lift lineups snaking through the Village Centre—the lifts they serviced completely out of sight. WTF! In that moment, I have to admit, I was yearning to be back at Plattekill!
In the end, the line for the Fitzsimmons Chair ended up being far shorter than at first glance. It turned out that the lift corral was empty, so once that filled up and the lift started spinning ahead of schedule, I quickly found myself on the chair and up the mountain by 8:15—well ahead of schedule!
With the alpine closed due to high winds and low visibility, I felt more constrained on the Whistler side than I felt the previous day. Most of the lifts open were direct transfers from the lifts transporting the hoards out of the base, so that left few options for escaping the crowds. I stuck to doing laps on the Emerald Express, a mostly beginner and intermediate pod, where I found some low angle glades with fresh snow to play in.
When the crowds eventually made their way to the Emerald Express, my appetite for skiing began to fade. The conditions and the terrain were good—great by eastern standards—but I just wasn’t feeling that inspired. Noticing that the 7th Heaven chair had opened up, I decided to take the Peak-to-Peak gondola over to Blackcomb.
Once on the other side, I had a particular destination in mind. While riding the Glacier Chair the previous day, I noticed some couloirs—the tops of which were only accessible from the 7th Heaven lift. They looked extremely enticing, and I wanted to see if I could locate their entrances.
At the top of 7th Heaven, visibility was limited, and I skied with trepidation into the fog—checking my location on Google Maps just to confirm I wasn’t heading somewhere I might regret. Then—there before me—a sign emerged from the cloud. ‘Pakalolo’. It was one of the couloirs I had seen from below.
Wind poured into the chute below, pushing me closer to the edge—and as the slope started to steepen—I found perfect wind sifted snow sloughing all around me as I descended the face. Score!
That run, and the runs that followed, were a turning point for me. In some ways, all weekend I had been looking for confirmation that—at least in this aspect of my life—the move was worth it. As it sunk in that what I had just experienced was not just an outlier, but represented something I could now tap into a little bit more reliably—I realized in some ways my dream had come true.
I certainly did. But I never truly considered moving away from New York until the past couple of years. The thought of moving was always stunted by practical matters—things like family, friends and careers. “I could never live out there”, I always told myself. And so I didn’t.
That all changed when I married a Canadian. When it came time to decide where to live and build a life together, we were both aligned on BC.
To be honest, despite all the superlatives used to describe Whistler, it was never at the top of my list of places to visit. I knew the skiing was world-class, but I was always more eager to check out other less visited ski destinations. You know, places that don’t get something like 1.1 million skiers per season. Now that I’ve moved to the Vancouver area, it’s not only at the top of my list—but with Covid—it practically IS my list.
It turned out that my suspicions about Whistler were correct. I expected the full corral for the Blackcomb Gondola that Saturday morning. But when I tried to enter what I thought was the line, a worker stopped me in my tracks and said, “The line starts back there”—as he pointed far in the opposite direction. The line for the gondola, which I could not yet take in the scale of, wrapped around the equivalent of a city block, eventually dividing into two—before merging back into the corral. My jaw nearly dropped.
This certainly wasn’t what I envisioned when I dreamt of moving west. An hour and ten minutes line to board a lift? Thankfully, once I finally made it up the hill, I found soft trails from a modest storm the day before.
My plan was to stick to the Blackcomb side and get acquainted with that side of the mountain—taking it easy since the recent move had robbed me of any chance to ski this season. With some groomer runs now under my belt, I eventually settled into laps on the Glacier Express chair, where runs like Blowdown were a standout.
The next day, I vowed to get in the lineup for the chair early. As I made my way through the village, the only signs of life at 7:30 AM were the scraping sounds of snow removal clearing the few inches of snow that fell overnight. Otherwise, it was dead quiet.
Imagine my reaction when I turned the corner to suddenly see lift lineups snaking through the Village Centre—the lifts they serviced completely out of sight. WTF! In that moment, I have to admit, I was yearning to be back at Plattekill!
In the end, the line for the Fitzsimmons Chair ended up being far shorter than at first glance. It turned out that the lift corral was empty, so once that filled up and the lift started spinning ahead of schedule, I quickly found myself on the chair and up the mountain by 8:15—well ahead of schedule!
With the alpine closed due to high winds and low visibility, I felt more constrained on the Whistler side than I felt the previous day. Most of the lifts open were direct transfers from the lifts transporting the hoards out of the base, so that left few options for escaping the crowds. I stuck to doing laps on the Emerald Express, a mostly beginner and intermediate pod, where I found some low angle glades with fresh snow to play in.
When the crowds eventually made their way to the Emerald Express, my appetite for skiing began to fade. The conditions and the terrain were good—great by eastern standards—but I just wasn’t feeling that inspired. Noticing that the 7th Heaven chair had opened up, I decided to take the Peak-to-Peak gondola over to Blackcomb.
Once on the other side, I had a particular destination in mind. While riding the Glacier Chair the previous day, I noticed some couloirs—the tops of which were only accessible from the 7th Heaven lift. They looked extremely enticing, and I wanted to see if I could locate their entrances.
At the top of 7th Heaven, visibility was limited, and I skied with trepidation into the fog—checking my location on Google Maps just to confirm I wasn’t heading somewhere I might regret. Then—there before me—a sign emerged from the cloud. ‘Pakalolo’. It was one of the couloirs I had seen from below.
Wind poured into the chute below, pushing me closer to the edge—and as the slope started to steepen—I found perfect wind sifted snow sloughing all around me as I descended the face. Score!
That run, and the runs that followed, were a turning point for me. In some ways, all weekend I had been looking for confirmation that—at least in this aspect of my life—the move was worth it. As it sunk in that what I had just experienced was not just an outlier, but represented something I could now tap into a little bit more reliably—I realized in some ways my dream had come true.
