A couple of years ago I saw an article on whistler in MBUK, and ever since I had been dreaming about getting here someday. Finally my Gap Year came around, and the dream began to come true. After working the money up throughout the beginning of the year I am finally out here! This blog will be following my trip week by week...Day 36: Saturday
Waking up to another fantastic day, I decided I would do a bit of exploring and find the sport climbing crag in whistler that people had mentioned. Starting by heading off down to "the core" (leisure centre) I went and bought myself a rope and climbing guide for the Squamish/Whistler area. After dropping the rope back at the lodge, I headed off to find the Nordic climbing crags, and they turned out to be around 5 minutes walk from our lodge! The amount of climbing on them is fantastic as well, with seemingly well maintained bolts into the bargain. After a long time snooping around, I headed back to the lodge feeling rather pleased with myself!
Day 37: Sunday
Another blindingly hot day! After a bit of a relaxed start, I went bouldering down at the creekside boulder. It being in the shade made it a really good option for such a hot day, despite the aching that comes from lack of practice! Riding back to the lodge in the cool evening air was also surprisingly nice, especially as the sunset was pretty spectacular.
Day 38: Monday
As Jack was going out onto the mountain for some runs in the park, I naturally had to borrow his hardtail for a day at the pumptrack which I had been quickly shown a couple of days before. After a fair amount of time getting to grips with this completely novel style of riding, I was beginning to get the hang of it, and really enjoying it. It would certainly seem odd (as it did to me beforehand) to most people who havn't really tried one as to why you would ride around in circles for long periods of time, but it is actually surprisingly fun and tiring! I also tested out my new contour hd, which I really like. Unfortunately at the end, some guy on a BMX slid out and hit his head very hard on the berm, and as he had no helmet he was knocked out and having seizures, which ended in a rapid 911 call and an ambulance taking him off to hospital. A bit of a nasty reminder of why to wear a helmet.
Day 39: Tuesday
Not much happened really! I just did a bit of shopping and resting, which is needed once in a while!
Day 40: Wednesday
With another incredibly hot day on the cards, I headed up to the main lodge to give my bike a bit of TLC, and ended up servicing the forks into the bargain. definitely worth it with Boxxers though as they feel so much nicer now! When the day had cooled down a bit, I went on a run and ended up discovering quite a few places I had not yet seen/visited yet, one of which being Alta lake which looked incredibly inviting in the evening sun!
Day 41: Thursday
A day back in the bikepark... After some warm up runs on the lower mountain (which is now incredibly dusty) I headed up top to try some more runs down from the Garbanzo zone, and found myself riding a very long list of trails... Original sin to goats gully to blue velvet to no joke to duffman to renegade to golden triangle to ho chi min to longhorn to hornet. Quite frankly an amazing combination! Certainly quite a tiring day overall, but a really fun one.
Day 42:
Feeling rather excited about getting out in the park again, I headed out with the intention of getting some video on my new contour HD... which I succeeded in doing, need to sort out where I point it though, and I have no idea why pinkbike kills the quality, but it is definitely worth getting! Here is a test run down A-line, need to point the camera up more though:
And so week six ended, and the Astrix is running sweeter than ever! Thank you for reading, sorry for any spelling errors, and see you next week!