We drove off at about 10 am on Monday morning, headed for Shannon Falls and the Chief mountain. The Chief is close to Squamish, which is about half way between Vancouver and Whistler. We stopped and looked up at the Falls before hiking halfway up the Chief for some great views of a beautiful river, rocks, trees etc. We were there for about 2 hours (including a little break for a picnic lunch) and loved what we saw. I'd be up for more exploring in that area another time. Rob was obsessed with the green, stringy moss that was growing over everything (hence the picture).
We continued driving from there to spend the night in Whistler Village at the Summit Lodge for 1 night (a HotWire find just for the 1 night before moving over to Club Intrawest right at the base of Blackcomb for the rest of our stay). We got there early enough to get all checked in, go pick up our lift passes for the next few days, explore the village, and try out a pizza place close by for dinner. Here are some pics from our Village exploration.
We went to sleep early and were all ready for Day 1 of skiing the next day. We got in a few good runs in the morning to get me comfortable on the mountain again. Then met with a free mountain tour group at 11:30 (highly recommend this for anyone heading to Whistler in the future this year or next - meet at the top of the mountain on Whistler and they'll show you all sorts of great runs you might not try on your own. Good fun skiing with the group too!). After a couple of hours on the tour, we stopped for lunch, did a few more runs on our own, and called it a day at around 3pm (mountain closes at 4, but we wanted to get checked in at Intrawest). That night, we had dinner in our room (chili and fresh bread), tried out the outdoor hot tub, and rented a movie. Nice night in to reset before next day of skiing.
Skiing with the tour group at the peak of Whistler, above the tree line.
Giving my left foot a break from my ski boot at lunch time
The victim:
The culprit:
On Day 2 of skiing, I had a half day group lesson scheduled to start at 9:45. Rob and I had a leisurely start to the morning and got me set up with a Level 3 group lesson. I learned a ton (while Rob was off doing moguls and terrain parks), but discovered that next time I'm in a lesson, I should really be in Level 4. Luckily, there were only 2 other students in my group, so I got the personalized tips I needed. I kept practicing the 1 or 2 key things I was taught for the rest of our time skiing and I think I made a lot of progress! Rob managed to find BeaverTails right in the middle of Whistler mountain while he was off on his own too! We skied together in the afternoon and didn't get off the mountain until just before 4 pm.
Dinner that night was Rob's favourite of the trip: The Old Spaghetti Factory!! Mmmm...Meatballs!
On our final day, we got all packed up and checked out before walking over to ski on Blackcomb (we'd mostly stayed on Whistler the other days, besides a quick trip across on the Peak 2 Peak Gondola). We went right up to the peak, which I have skied before on both mountains, but found some pretty windy, cold, poor visibility conditions. We skied down an easy green run from there before finding a beautiful group of runs in the middle of the mountain, all blue squares, and all really fun. So we kept finding new routes to try in that area.
Peak 2 Peak Gondola ride from Day 1:
Some of our favourite Blackcomb runs on ski Day 3:
On the way home, we were both exhausted, but happy that we had been so lucky with weather and snow conditions. And beautiful Sea to Sky views to enjoy on the road. All in all, it was a great, active little vacation that I'm happy we were able to get it in before the ski season ended!
-Sara
