Bye Bye Skiing, What Next?

Whilst I thoroughly enjoyed my instructors’ course, and am pleased with what I achieved, I am glad it is over. I reached a plateau with how much information I could absorb and how much more I could improve, without just skiing and enjoying it. So that is exactly what I have been doing: free skiing with no pressure; getting lots of consolidated miles on my skis; and working on the many faults in my skiing.

Skiing is fun

I have kept up the pretence of ski instructor training by attending a ‘teaching children’ Level 2 instructors’ module, and undertaking some shadowing of actual lessons at one of the ski schools, [got to keep one eye on the future]; both of which gave me a valuable insight in to the ski instructor industry. Shadowing actual lessons reminded me of the high standard required in order to be able to demonstrate drills and techniques correctly. This gave me a focus for my own skiing over the last few weeks.

Another day done

Looking ready

We also had our first visitor; my brother [again sporting yellow and black] decided skiing with me in Val D’Isere was so much fun that he wanted to come out and see the dream powder the Rockies are famous for, and maybe learn a thing or two from his kid brother. He went away after a week disappointed on at least one of those fronts, if not both. The march to summer has continued, practically bypassing spring, with temperatures soaring to 17˚C.  There was definitely no famed pow days, and I was once again reminded not to teach family. He was a better skier at the end of the week, but I think older brother pride and younger brother exuberance made it quite hard work for both of us. There were some amusing moments of miscommunication with me shouting, “don’t follow me here,” and my brother hearing, “follow me,” leading to him surprising himself with a jump or having to dodge a tree.

I have nearly made it to 50 days skiing in Canada, which I think is finally starting to take its toll on my body, lots of little niggles are starting to add up.  Compounded by the fact that I had an ejection and tumble that almost finished me off whilst skiing with my brother; possible my most kinetic of all, and again on a green run. I was following my brother down a little chute that I knew had quite a nice dip followed by a jump at the bottom. Not paying attention to the pile of skiers on our first aborted attempt and the fact that the light had gone quite flat, making it very hard to see anything in depth, let alone the dip; I rounded the bend getting ready to jump only to see my brother lying in a heap at the side of the jump. Half checking to see if my brother was ok and half carrying on at pace, I’m not exactly sure what happened next.  But it ended up with me sliding quite a long way on my chest, head and knees, headfirst;  my skis ended up even further away from me in different directions.  Whilst lots went wrong, at least I committed at full tilt to the jump. Amusingly whilst we were both regaining our composure, we watched two snowboarders and a skier also spank it in on the same jump. 

Falling; on board with my bro.

I am pretty much done with piste skiing for now; something I only really realised at the end of the day yesterday and which made me feel quite sad as it has been almost all I have done this year. Yesterday was a good day to finish on at Lake Louise, as I fully appreciated how far my skiing has advanced; ending the day on the ‘Men’s World Cup Downhill course’ I remembered how terrified I was of it 5 weeks ago, shitting myself whilst uncontrollably zig-zagging from side to side, hoping to make it down in one piece. Now I can tear down fully in control, from top to bottom at speeds that shouldn’t be attempted giggling like a small child all the way.

 












 




 
Skiing done; my thoughts are starting to turn towards my next challenge: a mountain skills semester with Yamnuska mountain school. To some extent they were forced to a few weeks back; having been emailed a 100 page ‘interpretive guides’ manual to read and digest, ready for an exam at the end of March.  What is an interpretive guide?  I quote: “One capable of creating high-quality, memorable and meaningful experiences for your guests”. Basically it means being knowledgeable about your environment – history, geology, landscapes, flora and fauna and being able to communicate this in an engaging manner. And essentially it is a prerequisite for being able to work as a guide in a national park in Canada.

I will spend the next three months learning; ice climbing, backcountry skiing, ski mountaineering, wilderness survival, mixed alpine mountaineering, rock climbing, wilderness first aid and avalanche safety. I will gain qualifications in many of these disciplines. The one I seem to be thinking about the most at the moment is the AST 2 [Avalanche Safety Training Level 2]. The bad snow [see previous blog] has made the backcountry very dangerous; unfortunately there have been several experienced locals killed in avalanches in the last few weeks.  I hope I don’t add to the list; but in all cases the locals were doing what they loved and thought chasing deep snow and the vertical was worth it. We’ll see.

In some ways good and in others bad, I have been expending a lot of time and effort, buying expensive gear in preparation for the course.  I love buying technical clothing and gear as much as any red blooded male, but shops and websites here don’t make things easy: we only have extra large in this store, the mediums are in Medicine Hat; your billing address isn’t in Canada, oh you can’t use our website, eh.  But hey the dollar is almost two to one at the moment, worth spending some time on bargain hunting. And the service in some stores is pretty awesome. I got a hand written thank you postcard, a $25 off voucher, $17 in reward points and some free Goretex care, clean and restore products from one store. Thanks Monod's of Banff.

Whilst the next few months hold many more adventures yet to come, I thought I would post some videos and pics of my last few weeks of free skiing.  Yes, several people have actually said they are enjoying the videos – even despite the poor resolution and obtrusive waternark.  Well, Enjoy!!!

Park Park.

In the Glades at Nakiska

Nice Poles

Steep Cliff?

Geoff following me

Medley 1: Ninja Clouds, spinning & ting

Medley 2a: Shadows, me and jumps

Medley 2b: more of the same