Exploring the Whistler Via Ferrata
If you haven’t already, check out our previous post about Via Ferratas and our experience on the Squamish Via Ferrata at the Sea to Sky Gondola. You can read that here: An Adventure on the Squamish Via Ferrata Well, after our morning out with the Mountain Skills Academy on the Squamish Via Ferrata we were psyched to check out the Whistler Via Ferrata next. The Whistler Via Ferrata was one of the first of it’s kind in Canada and we were told that it was a few grades harder than the newer one recently opened in Squamish. Fresh off our experience in Squamish we were excited to see for ourselves what it was like! It’s longer than the Squamish Via Ferrata being a 4 hour return trip from the Roundhouse on Whistler Mountain. Myself and Spring met up with our Guide and group at the base of the gondola in Whistler. From there we took the gondola up and got to know each other on the scenic ride up the mountain. At the top we went to a little cabin near the Roundhouse to get our harnesses, helmets and lanyards. Coming straight off our Squamish trip we felt like seasoned pros with the equipment. Weather couldn’t slow us down. We headed out promptly and got the day underway. Clouds were building overhead and weather looked to be rolling in but it didn’t slow us down. Right away we got that big mountain feel. From the Roundhouse you will be starting above the trees in the Alpine. We were surrounded by rock, ice and snow. After hiking for a bit towards Whistler Mountain we gained the base of our route and the fun of climbing the “Iron Road” began. We clipped into the security of the metal cable running along the length of the route and started moving upwards steadily. We could definitely feel that this Via Ferrata was different to the Squamish one. The rungs were further apart and in places you needed to hold onto rock to move upwards. It was varied and interesting but never too hard. A girl in our group had never done anything remotely like this before and she found it a lot of fun. We always had the reassurance that we were protected as we were clipped into the metal cable. Bringing back the High 5 on Whistler Mountain! The route had an awesome mountaineering feel. We traversed ledges, moved around blocky features, ascended steep cliffs, all while working our way towards the summit. If you want that feeling like you are aiming for an objective in the mountains and working to achieve it...
Learning to Ski Steeps with “Extremely Canadian”
This year myself and Spring at Pebbleshoo have set ourselves the goal of training and educating ourselves a lot more in regards to the activities we’re interested in. Being honest it has felt like our ski game has been stuck in 2nd gear for a while now. We both took an intro to skiing a few years ago, learning how to do a downhill wedge and ski bunny hills but apart from that we’ve been simply trying to teach ourselves the proper technique. It hasn’t worked. So recently we had the opportunity to take a 2 day Steep Skiing Clinic with Extremely Canadian out of Whistler. Our expectations with this clinic were to go from being cautious skiers capable of linking a few turns down black diamond runs to feeling confident on double black diamonds and skiing more fluidly and aggressively. Day 1: Our Mettle was really tested on the first day. It was awesome! It was a slow progression through the day of skiing steeper and steeper snow. First, after meeting our guides at the Whistler Base, we did a warmup ski run so our instructors could determine our competency and expectations. After watching our ski form we were split into groups and myself, Spring and two others were assigned to Extremely Canadian guide Peter. First up we did some laps on a groomed blue run so Peter could watch us and give us advice on how to improve our form. For balance we practiced picking our uphill ski off the snow while we completed a turn. I found this incredibly helpful right away and realized my balance was all wrong. Peter was great with giving individual advice to each of us to help us iron out our own specific issues. Next we practiced pole planting form. Something we’ve been sorely neglecting and it was definitely needed. From there, after warming up and some guidance, we cranked it up a notch and hit our first black diamond run, Whistler Bowl. We’d never skied it before but Peter was great with getting us into it safely. Skiing Moguls, but not as we knew it We did a few laps of Whistler Bowl, working on a few different techniques while getting used to the steeper angle. One of the techniques that stood out for me was skiing on top of moguls rather than between them. I was so focused before on trying to stay in the runnels between the moguls that I’d never thought to just ski the bumps on top of the moguls. The rest of the day was a mix of exploring the various bowls on Whistler Mountain and skiing steep...
14 Adventures in 2014
So last year we did a recap of our Top 13 adventures in 2013. It only seems fitting to follow suit this year with a look back on our Top 14 Adventures in 2014. It’s always interesting looking back over the photo albums. In hindsight an entire year can seem pretty short, it’s only when we actually sit down and remember what we did and where we went that we begin to realize just how much we packed into those 12 short months. It was a tough process cutting down our list of adventures to only 14. In the end we decided to cut out anything we didn’t do together, which was actually quite a lot. Spring did a ton of running in 2014, mostly solo or with some running friends. She also ran 80km of technical trails in the Squamish50 race. I was there, at the Aid Stations and the Finish line, but not beside her in the fray. Myself I got out a few times either with other friends or solo to visit some mountains I was interested in. Excellent experiences, especially the solo trips, but getting out with Spring and sharing the adventure always makes it better. If not for just the fact that I have a subject for my photographs. I also want to point out that both myself and Spring currently work full-time, 40 hours per week jobs. Myself, due to my work requiring an odd schedule, I worked about 60% of my weekends this past year. We’ve also increased the work we’ve been doing on Pebbleshoo by working with Brands and Companies we believe in to write for them and create content. To add to this, in 2014 neither myself nor Spring took any Holidays. You heard that right. Apart from the odd Statutory Holiday weekend of 3 days, we took no other periods of time off longer than 2 days. Mostly it was 1 day adventures. I guess the point I wanted to make is that there is 52 weeks in a year. There is no reason why you can’t make 52 unique memories from new Adventures every year. I’ve been working most weekends but we still make it work because we’re motivated. During the Summer, after finishing an 8 hour day at 5pm, there is still a good 6 hours of usable daylight to get out and explore. The most important step, and likely the most difficult for most people, is putting yourself in a place that enables the way of life you want to live. Living in our home of Squamish means that we rarely need to worry about commuting....
What gets us Stoked, V
A collection of videos that we loved watching this week. We especially love the video “Happy Winter”, and the Aerial footage of our home town of Squamish. ...
