Posts Tagged ‘spankys ladder’
Our Whistler Top 10
I can’t remember what sparked the conversation in the Ski Independence office, but we worked out that between us, we’d visited Whistler Blackcomb over 60 times. That’s far more than any other ski resort we feature but there’s a very good reason; Whistler is our biggest selling North American resort. Apart from meaning we’ve racked up a lot of both air and ski miles, and stayed in a lot of Whistler hotels it also means we know Whistler Blackcomb inside out. Our clients can therefore be confident our unrivalled Whistler knowledge allows us to recommend the perfect flight, transfer and accommodation recommendations to ensure the perfect Whistler ski holiday. Read the rest of this entry »
Top 5 expert runs in North America
We had a heated argument in the pub the other night about the top 5 epic expert ski runs in North America. The debate was fierce – what makes a ski run ‘epic’ – pitch, scale, snow, exposure, elevation, scary terrain features, fear factor, what?
Pitch can be conquered with bullet-proof technique. Scale means stamina. Runs always change their character in different snow conditions, weather, light and time of day. Exposure makes you feel alive. Elevation – no pain, no gain. Scary terrain features? I laugh in the face of ‘mandatory air’! Fear factor – beats the crap out of the X-factor. What should be included, and what criteria should we use? Does Snowbird have better terrain than Kicking Horse? Is the snow depth and quality in Fernie better than Crested Butte? Who can say, but in my opinion a truly epic ski run needs five qualities – (1) a degree of difficulty that keeps you thinking and working hard the whole way down. (2) a fear factor. (3) a tick-the-box factor. (4) an aura. (5) a scale that’s off the dial.
Winter Olympic Experience Day 3: Fresh Tracks
Got up at 6am on Friday to get ready for an epic ski day…
Jumped on the first bus at Creekside and travelled 5 minutes up the road to Whistler Village to grab our skis from the Salomon store underneath the Pan Pacific Mountainside. I’d rented a new pair of K2 Apache Xplorer all-mountain skis (which turned out to be so good, I think I’ll have to buy a pair). We then walked the 200m over to the Whistler gondola for 7.15am to head up the mountain for full buffet breakfast – this is called Fresh Tracks and is a separate ticket to your lift ticket: you get early access to the mountain and a huge buffet breakfast at the top of the mountain – it is one of Whistler’s best features, especially on a powder day. Today was a powder day!
