Living Life Outdoors

why go cat skiing?

James — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 00:12:29 +0000

This year has probably been one of my best skiing/snowboarding years in memory. I’ve spent countless days inbounds, had amazing powder, dropped some great chutes, thrown myself off jumps, cliffs and every other sort of huck in the area. The inbounds never really compares to out of bounds riding though. There’s nothing like the feeling of being alone in an area, no lifts pushing more people down the hill behind you, big mountains everywhere you look. Beautiful snowy features all around you, feels like paradise. The only problem I have with my out of bounds riding is that I don’t get enough runs in!

If I take the lift all the way to the top of my favorite resort I can put my skins on and start climbing up the next ridge, by the time I get to the very top I’ve already lost enough time for a few runs. As soon as I drop in I forget about the long skin up and how tired I am and start feeling the euphoria of riding powder once again…. but now I’m at the base. DAMN! Time to slap those skins on for another ascent. The tours are beautiful and I love being in these areas with my friends, if only we could get some more runs in!

What about heli skiing you ask!? This would seem like the obvious choice for many, and if I ran a hedge fund or a celebrity plastic surgery clinic this is what I might do. Unfortunately for guys like me the use of a chopper is a little out of my snack bracket. There are some clear advantages of helicopters though. No skinning up the hill, luxury accommodations, great meals, wicked snow and knowledgeable guides to show you around the area and keep up to date on the avalanche conditions. If only I win the lottery this year! This all sounds great, but I’m a little scared of falling out of the sky first of all, and what if I pay all the money to get up there and the chopper can’t fly due to weather conditions…. this is starting to seem like a very risky vacation. Mother nature never seems to cooperate with me.

Now if only there was something in between the hardships of ski touring with the catered heli ski life… let’s think for a minute. Ahhh so this is where cat skiing comes in.

Beautiful fresh untracked snow
Deeeeeeep powder!
Affordable, even for a guy like me? YES!
Cats operate in fog, snow, high winds…. got you this time Mama Nature!
All the luxuries of Heli Skiing

Now this seems pretty good, what’s the downside you ask? Well… the only bad part is that your vacation might be a little more relaxed because you aren’t rushing around to try and get into the chopper that’s costing $2000 an hour to run. Is this a downside? Well the only one I can find.

Why do I want to go cat skiing?

Why wouldn’t I?

If you’re looking for some cat skiing try Mustang Powder located in the Monashee Mountains between Revelstoke and Kamloops.

Cat Skiing at Mustang Powder

Kayak Season 2010

James — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 19:06:03 +0000

So the snow is metling quite a bit, at least here in the interior. So sad for skiing/snowboarding but those rivers are starting to flow! My friends and I just came back from paddling a couple rivers in the lower mainland and enjoyed ourselves despite the lower water levels, what can you expect from January paddling I guess.

Here’s a little visual kayak treat. Stakeout is a movie shot in Quebec, these guys are playboating on some of the biggest features I’ve seen. Looks amazing.

And if you don’t mind heading a bit further south you should check out the Santa Cruz Kayak Surf Festival 2010, March 26-28.

Kicking Horse Resort Early Opening

James — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 18:48:07 +0000

Kicking Horse Mountain Resort looks like it will be opening a little early this year due to incredible amounts of snow.
Kicking Horse Resort

Opening was scheduled for Dec 11th and now it will be Dec 4th. See you there.

2010 Snow Porn | Skiing and Snowboarding Movies

James — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 21:59:51 +0000

Well it’s that time of year, time to start getting ready for the season and to start hammering you eyes with amazing images of the lucky few who get paid to go test out the best snow in the world and then we buy their movies. These are a few of the movies that I’ll be checking out this year.

Forum Forever! Looks pretty sick from the teaser. This trailer gives me the feeling that I get when I go snowboarding with my boys. Just good friends and powder

Elektro 2010

I’m not sure If I just went to a rave (do they still exist??) or saw a snowboard movie

Creative People, Nice try. Lots of snowmobilin little boarding.

Neverland by Absinthe. SNOWPORN AT IT’S BEST!

The B! Burtons 2010 movie. The whole trailer is backwards, but it does look sick

Don’t worry Skiiers, I haven’t forgot about you. This is Rescession by TGR and it’s the most beautiful ski movie I think I’ve ever seen.

Flakes – PowderWhore. Right on Ski Touring! Not everyone needs a sled.

Middle Fork of the Salmon River 09

admin — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 00:44:08 +0000

A school trip down the Middle Fork of the Salmon River from Idaho to Montana. This amazing river started out at Marsh Creek with about 3 feet of snow beside us and maybe 15 cfs of water flow. By the end of the trip when we passed the confluence of the Main Salmon River it was raging at around 10 000 CFS and rising quickly every day.

I’m trying a new photo script on the site, so click on the thumbnail and the whole series should appear. From there you can click on all the photos to get a larger view.

The photo script is called Shashin and is available for free at Shashin

Idaho 09 best

WhiteWater Summer

admin — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 20:29:40 +0000

I had the fortune of being employed as a white water rafting guide this summer and it was a fantastic experience. Not only did I get to spend every day on the Fraser river, but I also got paid for it! When we weren’t taking clients down the river I had the chance to take my sister down on an inflateable Kayak and did a lot of regular kayaking with my boys, Brett and Shawn aswell. At the end of the summer I caved and bought my own boat, a Bliss Stick, Mystic, it’s amazing! I’m so pumped to have my own gear now.

So much fun on the river!

BC Tree Planting

admin — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 20:01:42 +0000

Another year of profitable and fun tree planting based around the BC’s beautiful interior. Blame the economy, the recession or whatever but tree prices were down unfortunately. Too bad for me I still made more money doing this than I can doing anything else, so another season it is! The start of the season was cold as hell and the contract started late due to the incredible amount of snow still on the ground. Once things got moving it all went smoothly though and we had some incredible time off in Wells Grey Park. A few of us opted to hike to a few waterfalls and check out Helmecken falls which is the tallest waterfall in Canada. Pretty cool stuff!

It’s a good thing you only take pictures of the fun times because just by looking at these pictures I’m excited for next seasons slavery! Happy planting.

Adventure Sports Video

admin — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 05:51:18 +0000

A short movie I made for my computers class. It’s mostly pictures from trips I’ve done in School including some moutaineering, white water kayaking, surfing, hiking and camping.

Skeet Skeet!

admin — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 20:07:38 +0000

Shooting some skeet at Kamloops shooting range with Jeremiah, Candice and Sandi

Ski Touring

admin — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 19:21:11 +0000

After a rocky start our ski touring trip got under way. We had a temperature inversion which resulted in a low lying valley fog. Our chopper couldn’t break through the cloud cover so we were stuck in Clear Water. Once we finally got a blue patch we were off. After a short ride in a 1960s snowcat from the owner of Wells Gray Adventures, our chopper picked us up.