Crazytimes in Whistler...

Well its been a few weeks since my last post and here we are sitting right between Christmas and New Years... The last few weeks have been a blast.. slightly crazy... busy as hell but still a blast ;-)

Snow has been awesome, Whistler has gone crazy nuts busy as Christmas usual with tourists all over the place, lift queues have grown, bars packed out... a good time to hide if you live around here.. Weve managed to beat the crowds with a busy house packing schedule, early morning riding and avoiding the bars with a few parties at home for Max's birthday and Christmas etc..

So the new year is fast approaching and weve still got a lot going on before we depart Whistler on Jan 6th.. We head to Seattle on Dec 31st for Keegans wedding.. driving down so that could be painful around the border but should be a fun and were back in Whistler on the 2nd.. Then its time to get the house all cleaned up and ready for inspection, squeeze in 2 or 3 more snow days and a few parties i imagine and then were outa here like a shaved pussy.. :-)

Ok.. so thats the round up.. Hope Christmas went smoothly for everyone out there and ya'll have a cracker of a time over new years.... 2008 is going to be a huge year for us.. .lots of hard work ahead but we cant wait.. good luck with your new years resolutions and we'll see ya soon..

R&N

Happy Birthday Max

Its December 25th!... and you know what that means!!..

Yup!. its Max's 30th.. Happy birthday mate..

R

3 weeks down 4 to go!

Killer day on the hill today.. Bit of new snow and a rockin possy rippin on Whistler...

Anyway this is snap of Mark aka Max.... on the way to the lift... am!

Fung Hoe Ver!!

Ouch.. meet up with Nic's crazy high school buddy Keegan last night....enough said!...

Anyway...Keegans in town for his stag weekend so we got to meet up with his brother and a few other dudes then head out JIS styles for the night..

Nursing a mean hangover but realising all i have to do is sit at a desk.... while my PIC (partner in crime) NIC has to clean up after dogs.. oh dear..

So i guess the choices are deal with it or accept that were old.... hehe..

DEALING WITH IT YO!.

Rx

Blast from the past!

Was flipping through some old pics from the start of '07 when all the fams were visiting Whistler. Seems it was the thing to do at the time.... Anyway found this one and thought it was a bit of cracker Fougere shot... :-)

44cm Overnight!

Finally we get our first really intense winter storm.. The village looks awesome.. Took a few snaps this morning on the walk to work.. theyre a little grainy though as i didnt realise in my haste that the camera was on ghetto photo settings.. Nevermind you get the idea.. .

R

The Schnow Schnick

A quick pic of nic by ric on our driveway. Its sick.

Doggy Daycare...

Heres a quick snap for you mils... Its your new Mountain Hound Lounge sign under snow..

Breaking News!

Its snowing again!!..

After a week of crisp weather and glorious sunshine we finally have snow new snow falling.. Its not much right now but the weathers gettin super crusty outside!..

Yippeeee ;-)

Hump Day!

Only the second day at work this week and its hump day!..

Back on to our winter schedules means thursday, friday and saturday off this week and snows on the radar... The reports are a little shakey but its looks like we could get 5-15cms between now and thursday which will make for a rockin little weekend if it happens..

Actually i just looked out the window and right now the weather seems to be closing in.. visibility up the hill is getting worse... still no snow but its gonna happen!..

hhmmmmm SnOW gets us eXciTed!

Ouch..

Hazy Sunday morning at work... Whole Lotta Led last night rocked. Max is in the house. Yesterday on the hill was fun.. Suns beaming today :-(.. bring on the dirty ol, crusty ol, intensey ol' snow bearing weather..

R

Another day another dollar...

Its Wednesay here in ol ye Whitsler town and im getting super amped for the weekend.

Kickin off Thursday we have blackcomb opening so Nic and i will be charging up early for some of the remaining untracked pow!.. The ski patrol and various departments involved in getting the mountain ready for opening have already had their pick this week of all the easy access stuff so we will have to hunt around but it should be rockin!

Friday we have Mark (aka Max) showing up from New Zealand for almost 2 months of Whistler action.

Saturday were gonna do the switch with Mark and show him around.. Start off close to home and head up the Creekside gondola on Whistler rip around a bit and then head over to Blackcomb for a mission. Then head back in the arvo to Whistler.. Saturday night is Whole Lotta Led at Dustys.. a great combo of a killer ski bar and legendary Led Zep cover band..

Stoked!

Breaking News!!

You heard it here first! Were packing our bags and very reluctantly leaving Whistler.

The mission ahead will be difficult but were going to shuffle to New Zealand and focus 100% on our web software Litmos.com...

We will miss all the friends and community in Whistler, not to mention the outdoors, snow, bikes etc.. but all going well we will be back before toooooo long..

R&N

Whistler Blackcomb PowCast

66cm Overnight and its still going

Big storms ahoy!.. we got 66cms overnight mid mountain and its crusty as hell weather down here in the valley..

No snow in the valley yet but it was pretty slushy this morning.. its been raining hard all day which means snow up top! and when the freezing level drops in the valley tonight we should take a good hit down here too!

Bring on the snow!

Rainy Sundays

Another rainy day here in Whistler.. a little snow overnight but it still hasnt quite made it down to the valley in a big way yet..

So with a small amount of hangover still lingering after an 'Ok' night last night at the Gnarcore flick im about to get stuck into some bug fixing.. sounds pretty excited.. well it is! i can tell ya that for sure.. haha..

Why was the night only 'Ok'... well we had to queue for an hour to get into an event that we had tickets for.. yawn.. they hit capacity in the bar due to doing door sales on an already sold out event.. duh!..

anyway.. happy sunday!

R

The Power Normal

The new Gnarcore snowboard film "The Power Normal" premieres tonight at Dusty's Saloon in Whistler Creekside.

Its a formal affair so we can expect a bunch of snowboarder punks dressed up in suits, consuming many beverages and going nuts in true whistler style..

Movie kicks off at 10pm... drinks before that at Dusty's (havent been there since last winter and its our local!!).... rockin venue! and we're stoked to see our buddy Dave's part up on the big screen.

Snax

Thought of the day...

Girls on Tour

Last weekend Christina, Jenna and I hit up the sleepy fishing town of Ucluelet on Vancouver island for a few nights of R&R...and lots of wine... just what the doctor ordered :o) We didn't do much else other than have hot tubs, cook, eat, do a coastal walk & visit an old growth forest. Thats a seal swimming in the harbour in the first photo!! Taken from our balcony where the hot tub was. They were always cruising by just checking out the catch of the day..

Get Well Didi Pie

Hmm.. not sure about the spelling of that one.. Im sure Didi isnt actually a Pie but hey.. GET WELL SOON..

The crazy little monkey is in the who spital and we wish her a quick recovery!!

Lupchoo Didi!

Senor & Senorita PorkChop

Float Plane over Whistler!

Last weekend we managed to swing a deal with a client from the dog daycare to get to go up for 45min tour over Whistler & Garibaldi National Park in a float plane.. Awesome views!!

Big Kahuna

This is a quick flick of Schnick on a section of "Big Kahuna" a black diamond trail in Emerald Estates, Whistler....

Awesome riding...this vids of a pretty easy section but the trail had some pretty challenging parts to it..

World Cup Time Again.. .

First game this weekend against Italy..

I hope the AB's rock this World Cup.. they deserve it!

BC Road Trip Photos

Heres a quick album..

http://picasaweb.google.com/richardchetwynd/BCAlbertaRoadTrip2007/photo?authkey=fe71etbzTU8#s5099902129399486418

Rafting for the gifted!

Haha.. we paid for the "photographer" shots on a recent rafting trip on the Kicking Horse river in Canada....



Had to crop this one.. hardcore yo! haha.. rich x

ps... click on the pic for the extra special version..

And with the sponsor signage...

Crankworx coming soon...

Check out the final jump in the Crankworx Slope style mountain bike course.. Its about 25 feet from the concrete blocks to the top on the take off and then the gap is about 30 feet..

Just to give you an idea of just how huge it is... the black box on the scafolding below the take off is one of those massive tv screens you have at sports games etc..



Anyway its all on starting this weekend and runs for a week... www.crankworx.com

Rich

Post #102!

Well the good news first!!! Rich and I just got approved on Thursday for new work visas for Canada!!! And this time - we're good for 2 more years - WAHOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! Man it has been some tense times lately.. Talk about leaving it down to the wire.. We had to be outta Canada by Aug 11 but had our fingers crossed for something working out before that.. And we are just sooooooo lucky that it all came through in time! Due to Richie being highly skilled and I.T pros in big demand in Canada, we get to carry on living our dream for a while longer!!

so thats the good news.. and some even more good news is there's no bad news!! YAY!

So again the invitation goes out to all our buddies to come visit, play, mountain bike with us, come snowboard with us!!

xx

A few random bike mission shots..

Can you believe it's Post #100!!!

Today I took 2 dogs out for a walk and saw a bear around the corner sniffing around so waited for a while until it had gone as the dogs go a little beserk around bears. After it had disappeared I carried on my way.. On my walk back, just when I thought the coast was clear, I came through a tunnel under the highway and saw a snout poking out the other side, out of a garden. He was up quite a bit higher than me, and luckily in the middle of his 'business' so was not about to disturb us.. But the dogs went a bit mad growling and barking.. Still blows me away that I get annoyed about hanging around waiting for a bear to move along so I can get the dogs out walking!! haha.

The Official Bear Tally from May up until now: Yes - it's a competition to see who spots the most bears this summer... childish I know.. hehe

and a few more..

the monkeys...

captain caveman

almost 10pm..

sausages and marshmellows over the fire..

and the photos..

A few pics from camping and the Pemberton 4x4 rally


Nic & Clay

Some big old 4x4 hill climber..

random crowd..

our campsite by the lake.