So my kick ass hot wife gave me a trip to Whistler as a Christmas present, due to work I was not able to go until this past weekend. It was the perfect time to go: “kids” are back at school/college (shorter lift lines), and the temps were very comfortable even with full armor.
I bought a bike specifically for Whistler and have been taking my time restoring it. Won’t go into all the issues… but let’s just say that the previous owner was less than competent when it came to bike maintenance.
Last minute parts showing up at 1:30pm – the build was finished at 3:30 on Wednesday. By 9:00 it was boxed up and ready to head off to Whistler on Thursday morning!
Arrive in Vancouver and meet up with –BB- , get our car and off to Whistler!
-BB- set up the condo, 2bdr with laundry and full kitchen – PERFECT!
Nice view of Blackcomb right out the window, Whistler to the right.
Bike assembly and beer!
Day 1: We didn’t go too crazy – wanted to make sure that we didn’t get injured or kill ourselves since we had 4 days here. Really liked “Original Sin” and “Goat’s Gully”, much more than any of the jump lines… but I suck at jumps. A-line jumps were much steeper than I have ever gone off, however I did OK on them… no crashes. On Day 1, I probably cleared all of 2 jumps.
Towards the end of the afternoon I tore a hole in the sidewall of my tire about 100’ from the top, so I did a quick and cheap repair ($1 bill) that was good enough to get us to the bottom.
I think if I had pushed it much further I would have blown another tube. Yup, tube was about to go – Dollar torn!
I bought a new tire and we headed back to the condo. Called it a day since it was mid afternoon, we had repairs to make, we had not had any food since breakfast, and we still have 3 days to ride!
Oh yeah, saw this fuzzy little critter near the top:
Day 2: Woke up ready to go… so we hit the mountain and had a blast! Everything was clicking; I was even starting to clear some of the A-line jumps!!! We rode both “Freight train” and “No Joke” from the top – awesome trails! Can’t even remember all the trails we rode mid-mountain and at the bottom… but we were having a BLAST.
Wait… what?
Then at the end of the day -BB- decided to call it a day and go back to the condo. I decided to do “one more run”, and went all the way to the top.
I took “Original Sin” to “Goat’s Gully” down to “Fatcrobat”, having a great time and making great time. Then it happened… ripped my rear derailleur off. Luckily the hanger failed as designed and the derailleur was still functional. I turned the bike into a single speed for the trip down (still more than ½ way up the mountain).
Went about 5’ and slipped on a rocky/root section – OTB!!! Damn slow speed crashes suck… landed just off the trail, with bike following closely behind. For those that know this area will realize that going off trail means you end up sliding (or tumbling in my case) quite a distance. I’d say about 15’ until I landed on the next section of trail… then the bike landed on me. I got up feeling Ok except my hand. I had slammed my palm on a rock – it hurt to grip the bars. However still needed to get to the bottom – so jumped on the bike and rode down. I couldn’t grip with my thumb, so I held the handlebar with my index finger (thumb over the bar next to finger) and used my middle finger for the brake (ring and pinky on bar as norm).
Off to the shop for a new hanger and rear shifter cable…
When I got back to the Condo -BB- gave me his icepack for my hand… after that got too warm we improvised.
Do I look like I’m in pain?
Day 3: Very short day, got a late start (must have something to do with my pain killer from the night before). We got a good 3 or 4 runs in, including some from the top, before it happened – I crashed and smacked my hand. About 20 min later I crashed again, hitting same hand and smacking my head. Could barely hold onto handlebar – time to do the smart thing and call it a day.
We did find this little fun spot in between the above mentioned crashes…
I know the pro’s and folks with more skill are simply gapping this, but -BB- and I decided it was smarter for us to roll it (this time). The sequence should look like this:
But no:
Maybe next year I’ll hit that the way it is intended… here are a few more things we did not ride, and probably will not next year:
Day 4: Last day – picture heavy.
One crash on this day: Starting down “Side Track” and a branch snags my handle bar… hit my hand again!!! However it didn’t hurt so I jumped up and tried to catch up to -BB-. It was only later that I pulled my camera out to find that it had taken the impact of a rock. LCD display was shattered – but it still worked, so we got a few last images before we ended our day.
One drop that I was unsure of the first day was the GLC drop. I don’t know why it bugged me but it did… until the last day:
Damn that thing was NOTHING… just goes to show that you gotta ride it to know if you can do it.
Then it was over...
We packed up the bikes and headed home. I was sad to go, however I do miss my wife.
Can’t wait for next year – Anyone else want to go next September? West Coast Monkeyfest?
I bought a bike specifically for Whistler and have been taking my time restoring it. Won’t go into all the issues… but let’s just say that the previous owner was less than competent when it came to bike maintenance.
Last minute parts showing up at 1:30pm – the build was finished at 3:30 on Wednesday. By 9:00 it was boxed up and ready to head off to Whistler on Thursday morning!
Arrive in Vancouver and meet up with –BB- , get our car and off to Whistler!
-BB- set up the condo, 2bdr with laundry and full kitchen – PERFECT!
Nice view of Blackcomb right out the window, Whistler to the right.
Bike assembly and beer!
Day 1: We didn’t go too crazy – wanted to make sure that we didn’t get injured or kill ourselves since we had 4 days here. Really liked “Original Sin” and “Goat’s Gully”, much more than any of the jump lines… but I suck at jumps. A-line jumps were much steeper than I have ever gone off, however I did OK on them… no crashes. On Day 1, I probably cleared all of 2 jumps.
Towards the end of the afternoon I tore a hole in the sidewall of my tire about 100’ from the top, so I did a quick and cheap repair ($1 bill) that was good enough to get us to the bottom.
I think if I had pushed it much further I would have blown another tube. Yup, tube was about to go – Dollar torn!
I bought a new tire and we headed back to the condo. Called it a day since it was mid afternoon, we had repairs to make, we had not had any food since breakfast, and we still have 3 days to ride!
Oh yeah, saw this fuzzy little critter near the top:
Day 2: Woke up ready to go… so we hit the mountain and had a blast! Everything was clicking; I was even starting to clear some of the A-line jumps!!! We rode both “Freight train” and “No Joke” from the top – awesome trails! Can’t even remember all the trails we rode mid-mountain and at the bottom… but we were having a BLAST.
Wait… what?
Then at the end of the day -BB- decided to call it a day and go back to the condo. I decided to do “one more run”, and went all the way to the top.
I took “Original Sin” to “Goat’s Gully” down to “Fatcrobat”, having a great time and making great time. Then it happened… ripped my rear derailleur off. Luckily the hanger failed as designed and the derailleur was still functional. I turned the bike into a single speed for the trip down (still more than ½ way up the mountain).
Went about 5’ and slipped on a rocky/root section – OTB!!! Damn slow speed crashes suck… landed just off the trail, with bike following closely behind. For those that know this area will realize that going off trail means you end up sliding (or tumbling in my case) quite a distance. I’d say about 15’ until I landed on the next section of trail… then the bike landed on me. I got up feeling Ok except my hand. I had slammed my palm on a rock – it hurt to grip the bars. However still needed to get to the bottom – so jumped on the bike and rode down. I couldn’t grip with my thumb, so I held the handlebar with my index finger (thumb over the bar next to finger) and used my middle finger for the brake (ring and pinky on bar as norm).
Off to the shop for a new hanger and rear shifter cable…
When I got back to the Condo -BB- gave me his icepack for my hand… after that got too warm we improvised.
Do I look like I’m in pain?
Day 3: Very short day, got a late start (must have something to do with my pain killer from the night before). We got a good 3 or 4 runs in, including some from the top, before it happened – I crashed and smacked my hand. About 20 min later I crashed again, hitting same hand and smacking my head. Could barely hold onto handlebar – time to do the smart thing and call it a day.
We did find this little fun spot in between the above mentioned crashes…
I know the pro’s and folks with more skill are simply gapping this, but -BB- and I decided it was smarter for us to roll it (this time). The sequence should look like this:
But no:
Maybe next year I’ll hit that the way it is intended… here are a few more things we did not ride, and probably will not next year:
Day 4: Last day – picture heavy.
One crash on this day: Starting down “Side Track” and a branch snags my handle bar… hit my hand again!!! However it didn’t hurt so I jumped up and tried to catch up to -BB-. It was only later that I pulled my camera out to find that it had taken the impact of a rock. LCD display was shattered – but it still worked, so we got a few last images before we ended our day.
One drop that I was unsure of the first day was the GLC drop. I don’t know why it bugged me but it did… until the last day:
Damn that thing was NOTHING… just goes to show that you gotta ride it to know if you can do it.
Then it was over...
We packed up the bikes and headed home. I was sad to go, however I do miss my wife.
Can’t wait for next year – Anyone else want to go next September? West Coast Monkeyfest?
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