Avalanche Skills Training and Backcountry Pow

So with the end of contracts at Evergreen came a fair amount of spare time! Al and I decided that to fill this we would do the avalanche skills training levels 1 and 2. This turned out to be a brilliant idea as meant that we got to enjoy 5 days of backcountry touring, fascinating snow skills and the best snow in 3 different resorts (Tsugaike, Cortina and Happo).  With brilliant guides Dave Enright and Bill Glude we were in safe hands even on the high risk avalanche days, however this didnt mean that the days that passed were uneventful! I had a near miss on the first day of the level 2 after falling and sliding headfirst into a very deep hole around a metal telegraph pole. I managed to then get buried under the snow that fell in on top of me so that only my legs, skis still attatched in true comedy fashion, were left sticking out of the snow! I managaed to dig my face out just in time for another bunch of snow to fall in on me. Had to just lie there and wait for the others to dig me out and quite frankly it was pretty terrifying! thankfully I was only down there for 3 mins and got away with just a bit of sore neck. Following this event I avoided all large holes in the snow and enjoyed some epic powder and tree runs over the next 2 days including a hike in to the happo north bowls which was what you could describe as big mountain riding! An amazing few days of learning and loving life!

 Alex in the Cortina Pow! a rare powder skiing photo!

 Me skiing alarmingly well after my near death experience!

 After being pulled out of the hole (see behind) and still looking pretty scared!

 Alex and I at the end of a successful days backcountry!

Anderson and I's ski tracks down the happo bowl!

Iwatake

This week we decided to explore and so headed over to the neighbouring resort of Iwatake! The first day we went was brilliantly blue skies and some lovely fresh tracks in the nicely spaced trees, brilliant expert terrain and some hilarious bails from Ryan. The resort not only offered great skiing but also some amazing views back across the valley to happo-one and down the valley. In addition there was slacklining and tubing thrown in for free too! Our second trip was again blue bird and excetremely hot! Although the snow was slushy we had a great time cruising around in a big group. The park on the first visit had provided much entertainment and some great photos but on our second visit we unfortunately had to get ski patrol involved when hana decided to backslap the floor from a jump! thankfully all were ok and many great photos came from the misfortune!

 Me, Kate, Ali, Amanda, Luc and Ryan at Iwatake

 View over to Happo-one

 Slacklining! and park times!!

 Iwatake round 2 Hanas injury! and some playing around on skis!