If you were born in the eighties (the eighties) you’re probably familiar with the notion of “combo”, as it is understood in fighting video-games. Street Fighter II, Mortal Kombat, Kings of Fighter (2D will prevail!), ring a bell? If not, you can either check wikipedia or read the next lines if you’re still following me (sometimes I’m wondering how obscure my posts are with my awkward written-English and my dumb references…). So basically a “combo” is when you do several winning moves in a row without being hit by your opponent. The bigger the combo (double, triple, x5…), the harder you hurt the other guy. Anyway(s?) a while ago I came up with the concept of “life combo” which is a particularly good series of events in someone’s life. It’s the moments when you feel you’re winning over life because you enjoy every single bit of it. Naive? Well I can tell I’ve been in an impressive “combo move” since the beginning of 2008 and yesterday was probably the ultimate “high kick”, 24 hours of awesomeness. Report.
5 a.m: Alarm clock is ringing, earlier than ever. The evening before I convinced a friend to go to Whistler with me; here we are, ready to go down the slopes. Or not really, it’s 5 a.m, I’m in my bed… I wanna sleep more!
5.30 a.m: To myself: Debout sleepy head! I didn’t buy a Whistler package to miss the 6 a.m bus at UBC loop. Speaking of the package it cost me $120, and included the bus ride, the rental and the ski lift. Pretty expensive but that’s a good deal if you don’t have the golden “season pass” (which was really cheap for UBC student at the beginning of the season, in November). Corn flakes, banana, bike ride to the loop. Easy as a b c.
6.15 a.m: From Friday to Sunday UBC students have the opportunity to take the Greyhound right from the campus to goup to Whistler. Another student privilege I guess. We were in peak season, the bus was packed.
Inside the Greyhound at 7 a.m in Squamish
8.20 a.m: I think a fell asleep while I was staring at the amazing landscape that surrounds the highway. It was still very dark but I could guess the dark mountains literally falling in the ocean. Breathtaking. I woke up in Squamish, last stop before Vancouver. A lot of snow already which is a good sign for fresh snow up in the mountains.
9.20 a.m: Arrival at Whistler village, which is as nice as it is on pictures. Contrarily to some ski resorts in Europe you don’t have tall ugly buildings here, wood and stones are predominant and even if you have a “Disneyland feel” it’s not ruining anything. It’s pretty. We had the biggest muffin ever (there was at least two bananas and a cup of blueberries in it) at a café called Moguls, and the espresso was actually a real one, Italian way.
“Good day sunshiiiine pompopompom…”
9.50 a.m: After a stop at the ski rental shop we were finally ready. Few clouds and not too low temperatures made my friend say that it was going to be a very very good day. And as it’s from a guy who has already gone to Whistler almost fifteen days during the season it’s a word you trust.
10 a.m to 3.20 p.m: BLAST! We joined some friends (from Luxembourg, Germany and Norway), they’re all pretty skilled and I was first wondering how I would be able to follow them with my non-technical style. I can go down anything but not always in a regular way if you see what I mean. ; ) Whistler is in fact divided in two main peaks, Whistler and Blackcomb. First run was on Blackcomb, up up the mountain. After the lift a ten minutes walk allowed us to reach the Glacier and… A-WE-SOME! I’ve skied since childhood in the Alps but on this first slope, down the Glacier, it was no less than the best snow I’ve ever experienced! Almost virgin powder, with a perfect feel: even with my too short skis (to the guy at the rental shop: 1m50 skis?? Dude, I’m 1m80!) I enjoyed this very peculiar feeling of floating on snow. Ski (and related activities… llike, let’s say snowboard) is a lot in your head, there’s something very soothing for the mind in just sliding, moving your body in a very unnatural way and yet very instinctive and smooth. Well, it’s in your head until your muscles are hurting like shit not even after ten minutes in the powder! Geez, the first run was so dull for my entire body! Fortunately I used a VIP pass (yeah, that’s how you’re treated when you work in a smoothie bar!) at Gold’s Gym through the past week, which allowed me to do some exercise before the real fun. I should write an entire post about the gym, it’s quite a fascinating place (yes, running indoor for 40 minutes lets time for people-watching). But back to my skis: non-stop up and down for more than five hours! Blackcomb, then Whistler, forest runs, as well as speed runs, there’s a lot of things to do on these mountains! Believe me, this was enough to be really burnt out by 3 p.m (the slopes close around 3 p.m anyway). I was amazed to see that the place wasn’t crowded at all and as a result you don’t spend to much time in line-ups for the gondola and the feeling of space up on the slopes is great.
3.45 p.m: It’s time to refuel! Nothing better than a big plate of penne with grilled chorizo at The Old Spaghetti Factory. For $15, tip included, you can have a salad, coke, the main dish, an ice-cream and a tea or coffee. We spent to much time in the restaurant trying to finish our plates and we ended up missing the 5 p.m bus… fortunately!
5.45 p.m: The way back home is a story in itself. Next bus was at 6.30 p.m, arriving in Vancouver at 9.30 p.m. Ouch, weren’t I suppose to have diner at UBC with a friend at 8 p.m? Pretty annoyed, me and my friend stopped by the main road in Whistler village, put our best smiles on your face, took our hands from our warm pockets and decided… to hitch-hike! It’s always worth trying after-all, and it’s safe as long as your not alone. Canadian hospitality is real, a couple of cars stopped during the first eight minutes but were not going down to Vancouver. The third one was our man! Grey-haired, in his sixties, nice black berline, leather seats… We soon learned that he was actually the employee of a limo service! No kidding, this guy had driven some upper-class guys up to Whistler from YVR airport and he was offering us a free ride to downtown. So that’s how we met Eric (fake name). He was such an amazing dude: Led Zeppelin fan (we spoke about the re-united concert); moved to B.C in the 70’s; supporter of Barack Obama; drove Princess Sofia from Roumania, Will from Will&Grace TV show and some other stars; even played in four X-Files episodes (!). I swear I did not dream this part, not even when I say that after twenty minutes of nice talking he kindly offered us… weed, already rolled and ready to smoke! I know “British-Columbians” are huge weed consumers (of B.C organic stuff, some say the best on earth…) but this was so unexpected, the situation switched to pure surrealism. Who’s reading this blog? Oh, yep, my mum so I won’t tell what we did with this offer… Haha. : p
9 p.m: Back “hoooome”! I was so exhausted I could have fallen asleep right away… that was counting without the We Love Daft Punk party I mentioned in the previous post! A quick shower (good beyond goodness though!) was the only thing I had time to do before heading to a friend’s place in Gage tower, UBC’s biggest residence building.
10.30 p.m: This party was no joke: when we arrived it was packed and a huge line-up was told that nobody would get in unless on the guestlist. The guestlist? Too bad, we were not on it… So what could I do? Put to an end this amazing “life combo” by really punching the bouncer (and thus being punched back and going back home covered in blood without partying? Bad karma about that) ? Start to cry just like one of my friend did once (Maaaax :p)? Pretend I was with this very good-looking girl who actually took my hand while getting in? From inside we were hearing the loud bass of Around the World, people on the guestlist were gleefully getting in… and we would stay out of this mayhem? No way!
11.30 p.m: It took us almost one hour but we did get in! How? Here’s the recipe: self-confidence thanks to a couple of drinks we had before, a very well calculated calm behaviors not to upset the bouncers and… a big fat lie! I won’t go into the details but, honestly, this was brilliant, I didn’t even know I could be so good at doing that. To give you a clue: French accent helped.
11:30 p.m to 2:30 p.m: For some reasons (well, maybe vodka-tonic) the fatigue was long gone. We had a blast still laughing like kids thinking about our little scheming. The Biltmore Cabaret is a nice place, sound system wasn’t bad at all and we danced non-stop for about three hours. In the end there’s nothing like a night out after a day out, or at least that’s what I think but my legs don’t agree on this point.
5 a.m: In my room at last, enjoying the last bite of my egg and bacon plate. Behind me there’s twenty-four hours of activity; I didn’t save the world but I could contemplate with serenity my little Jack Bauer achievement. And then? Pouf, dreamless deep sleep. Saturdays…
note: no camera on the slopes, no pictures. And I just realized I actually “cut” a long story… long! Nobody’s gonna read that (or maybe you Mum…), it’s for my personal records.
Filed under: Canada, In Da Club, On the Road, Vancouver by Robin Pineau
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