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Dom-Ebel.com: Flipside Streetboards' Tour 2008 : streetboarding Canada...
flipside tour home
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tour article archive
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flipside streetboards
band of the tour:
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monday 23th june - me birthday!
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 Hot weather = streetboarding again! And lovin' every minute of it...
The Whistler park has a great launch box, shaped just right for hitting up big tricks and floating huge airs - the perfect way to while away the long summer evenings!
 However, the same hot weather de-stabilised much of the snow on the mountains, resulting in a few large-scale avalanches.
Whole faces collapsed, including this one which came to rest only 30ft away from the Blackcomb boardpark...
Spring is one of my favourite times of the season, the retreating snow opening up a whole range of previously-unexposed possibilities...
I spied this flat rockface, which looked like a great location for a days wallriding - so my friend Sebastian and I spent an afternoon hitting it and getting some footage down. You can see this soon in the upcoming video... Apologies for the lousy quality - they didn't capture well :(
 The turning season and melting snows have seen the cycle of life start all over again, bringing out the colours in the landscape and creating photo opportunities wherever I look - so I have documented some of the views we see everyday around Whistler Creekside and the surrounding area...
The Blackcomb gondola has shut and the route up the mountain has changed, requiring riders to use 2 chairlifts instead - slower, but they pass right over bear territory, enabling me to get some more shots of those furry critters for your enjoyment:
CJ & I have acquired a couple of mountain bikes (thanks Stuart!) and have started riding some of the trails around the valley. Like many mountain resorts, Whistler has invested heavily in the mountain bike scene - creating a vast network of dedicated downhill trails and bike parks for paying customers and more sedate valley trails for everyone to use free of charge.
Some of the terrain avaiable to the dedicated riders verges on the terrifying, with many riders padding up in many cases beyond the limit that road-going motorbikes would consider using.
 Being of sound mind, we have stuck to the valley trails which run up and down the valley, cross-crossing to create a web which reaches some of the more remote areas - easier to reach by bike than by car. CJ found this log-walk in "Lost Lake" and managed to walk there and back without falling, despite my prediction to the contrary...
Our 2 weeks complementary snowboard pass for the Glacier Park have finished - so our season riding snow has come to an end. The park terrain had diminished considerably since the Blackcomb Snowboard Park closed, and snowboarding has lost its lustre for the moment - it feels like the right time.
I'm loving the streetboarding now - you guys know its my true calling ;o)
So, guess its time to embark on my 34th year - here we come!
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sunday 19th may
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Spring is finally here!
 The hot weather means CJ and I are getting out and about in town, lapping up the sun and acting like complete tourists...
Spending time working on our tans and watching bikers come down the newly opened mountain bike park - awesome!
The same heatwave means streetboarding is back on the cards, hitting up the launch ramp in Whistler Village skatepark and riding nights in the minature skatepark in the multi-storey car park opposite our apartment. Media to come soon..!
Spent the last few weeks with the aussi brothers jibbing the hits and boxrails round here, throwing down tricks and ramping up the ante - working on my boxrail spins, pretzls and other variants, while the aussilads worked on progressing on their tricks.
The snow quality has gradually got more slushy over the last couple of weeks, rendering the runs on Blackcomb mountain less rideable. There was fresh powder in the backbowl (over the back of the glacier) up till last week, but the last few days have reached temperatures in excess of 20degrees - so the focus has shifted from riding the pistes to shredding the park.
 On a different matter, the warmer weather has brought the bears out of hibernation. CJ & I saw our first bear from the Blackcomb gondala the other day - we were so excited! Bears are a natural part of the habitat here, and this one is a young one that lives near to the mid-station of the gondola, and is a bit of a local celebrity.
 CJ & I have moved into our own 1-bedroom apartment. it is such a great place - the biggest place we have ever had, with access to a communal pool, hot-tub and BBQs.
It has a sweet kitchen, flat screen TV & DVD, our own patio, central heating & fire - luxury!
So life is looking pretty good at the moment, filled with snowboarding and streetboarding - but with only a few weeks left on the mountain pass, collecting footage is the priority now...
Guess its about time to get some streetboard footage down...
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wednesday 30th april
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April started with a bang - a smokin' backyard BBQ mini-shred saw the closing days of the backyard park off with a bang - click below:
Being the end of the season, the boys decided to go for a switch-up day: us snowboarders tried skiing, and Pat the skier tried snowboarding
Not being the types to go half-hearted at anything, we dressed in clothing appropriate to skiers fashion - and threw ourselves headlong down the slopes.
We had a fantastic day spending hours hooting with laughter, and I have to say that everyone there did remarkably well with no stragglers at all. However the most impressiveg convert was Pat, who by the end of his first run was linking turns, and by the second was snowboarding properly. I have never seen this before - and from a 43-year old die-hard skier? Unreal!
I spent an afternoon skating at Castlegar skatepark, as I had heard that it was one of the Kootenay's best outdoor parks - boy, was I rusty on the rails since last skating in November! Dispite taking a proper stack, I continue to be impressed as to the public amenities available to relatively small towns, similar to those available in New Zealand.
Before leaving Rossland, I must tell you about Jons LP record covers, truely the sickest wall decorations in the northern hemisphere.
From Roger ("The Saga Continues..."), to the priceless Scandanavian Interlude, Wayne King and his Orchestra (because everybody loves Wayne King ;), and the frankly unbelieveable Kroeze family - each and every one is a classic! See for yourself...
Having said goodbye to our friends, CJ and I left Rossland, opting to head east to Vancouver by dropping into the U.S., rather than take the same Canadian route we have done 3 times before.
We drove south to Spokane, then east along the (alledged 4.5 hour - whatever...) highway to Seattle, where we stopped off by the Wanapum viewpoint for a stunning panorama of the mighty Columbia River (one of the longest in North America).
Continuing east, we spent the night near Seattle, before driving through city to head north through Bellingham to Vancouver - and our final destination of Whistler.
We arrived in Whistler at the start of the Telus Festival - a combination of snow sports events (such as the Big Air and Halfpipe) and music concerts - bringing more people into town than at any other point in the season. Not a good time to search for accommodation! However, after a couple of days of concerted effort and viewing rooms, we found a room available for a couple of months, perfect for our spring pass.
We were joined by our aussie friends Tom and Mike Stranger, and kiwi buddies Logan and Boots - our co-conspirators from the Black Bear kickers! The aussies decided spend a couple of months in town, working in the construction industry - and after a bit of wrangling, we managed to sort them accommodation in the same house as us - deja vous..?!
 The highlight of the Telus festival was the Jon Butler Trio. Amazing talent, not only playing multiple instruments in a variety of ways, but using innovative techniques such as singing through the guitar soundbox, so that his voice was picked up through the strings - giving it a distinctly metallic sound. Superb.
Tom had lived previously with his sister, so we wound up chatting to her over drinks in the bar afterwards - a very pleasant down-to-earth person, apparently like Jon himself.
Whistler ski area is composed of 2 mountains - Whistler and Blackcomb, combining to give a vast amount of terrain. Unfortunately, apart from a couple of days of good weather at the beginning - the weather has been very poor, going from sheet ice to overcast pouring rain, conspiring to limit the amount of time we could ride before Whistler mountain closed.
It was Toms 30th birthday last week, and his brother Mick secretly arranged a special birthday treat for him - snowmobiling!
After managing to keep up the charade of a normal day on the mountain, the four of us embarked on a 2 hour trip driving snowmobiles up the Whistler backcountry, led by a guide up road where the loggers used to drive so fast down, they removed their doors in case they had to bail out!
The trip culminated on a fantastic viewpoint on Rainbow mountain, where Mick presented Tom with a birthday cake, with the number "30" spelt out with candles... Unforgettable!
So the weather has finally improved and we have the warmer springtime weather that has been ominously lacking - the snow has softened up, and we can get jibbing without fear of breaking bones.
Bring it on..!
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monday 31st march
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Late powder dumps at Red meant I wound up heading out to Nelson alone, taking my streetboard to check out the park and get riding again - expecting to find the usual bustle of people all competing for lines.
Instead I found a huge empty warehouse, with no one around to ride apart from me and a couple of people playing pool...
Nelson is a great park, with all the benefits associated with the biggest UK ventures, nestled out of the way in the BC interior - situated in a town of barely a few thousand people..!
I set about hitting up the 10ft quarterpipe and trying to bust out as much air as possible, but unfortunately as I was alone I didn't get any footage, nor go as big as I would have wished in case of injury :o( C'est la vie.
 Our housemate from Wanaka '05, Tim Andrews, came to stay with us for a week.
Tim is a telemark skier of considerable ability, and joined us en route in the middle of a 2 month backcountry tour of British Columbia.
An unexpected 3-day snow dump prompted our crew to make a spontaneous roadtrip to Revelstoke - the newest resort in BC and destined to become the largest vertical drop in north America.
So aussie brothers Tom and Mike, housemate Jon, Pat the local, CJ and me piled in 3 cars and drove convoy - at one point using a free ferry crossing to bridge the Upper Arrow Lake upon which Revelstoke is located.
Revelstoke resort is situated on a high mountain, remeniscent of european alpine terrain - although there are currently only 2 lifts (a gondola and a high-speed chair), the resort already has a vertical drop of 1440m (4724ft) - about to be increased to 1829 (6000ft), making it the 4th highest vertical drop of any resort in the world.
The terrain is fantastic, mixing up long tree runs with the huge North Bowl powder face, and with an expansion programme taking the number of lifts from 2 to 20 and opening up the cat-skiing bowls - of an unbelieveably large scale.
I had the fortune to bump into another friend from Wanaka '05 by complete chance - Greg Seiffert was staying at the "Mountain View" hostel with the rest of us, and it was great to catch up with him for a beer - although he was unfortunately only over on a day trip from Banff/Lake Louise and not staying. It was great to see him though - nice one mate ;o)
We had, a great 3 days ripping up fantastic powder and all experienced "the stoke" - completed by a trip to the Halcyon Hot Springs thermal spa.
 WOW - this place left me speechless.
That was the most amazing place, floating around outside in natually heated thermal spas on the outdoor terrace, overlooking the Upper Arrows Lake with the air chilly around you as the sun goes down... Stunning.
 On one of our short trips over the border into the U.S., CJ and I visited the town of Colville.
A small town, the pace of life seemed slower here, and we found genuine wild-west facades down a side street - nice!
 Both on this journey and the trip to Nelson, we passed spectacular dams and hydro-electric power stations.
The very scale of these has to be seen to be believed, it beggars belief that THAT much water can be held back... :o0
Well it's snowing hard at the moment, but we've only a week or so left of the season in Rossland, so we're now looking at the possibility of extending our snowboarding with a spring pass at Whistler - as the season the runs into June ;o)
The issue with Whistler is the abject lack of accommodation - which was beyond ridiculous when we visited back in January - heres hoping we have more luck this time...
Wish us luck..!
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newsflash!
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New snowboarding movie edit out now - the Black Bear Kickers!
3 kickers, 3 days - our crew descended on the Rossland location and built and hit these kickers, built on the slag piles left from mining operations in the hillside below...
Click the player below to watch the movie!
Also - the Flipside "I Know..." streetboarding collection in embedded format, again, click to play:
Enjoy ;o)
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wednesday 5th march
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 In a change of plan - we spent the last week building kickers instead of streetboarding...
Our friends Tom & Mick, Australian brothers living up the road, had spotted a great location for kickers - perfect for a range of hits, and hidden from general view.
We constructed 3 kickers on 2 different hills: the original Gap Kicker on one, the Huge Kicker and Under Kicker on the other.
 The "hills" were actually 2 gigantic manmade slag heaps, sited above the entrance to the now-defunct Black Bear mineshaft.
This was originally owned by the "Le Roi" mining company - back in the days when Rossland was a Gold Rush town...
The Gap Kicker was constructed and bombed out during our first day - a 20ft gap on the side of the hill. The snow was perfect that day, great for building but even better for landing, so we spent about 4 hours hitting it in the spring conditions.
Over the next couple of days we constructed and rode the other 2 kickers, situated one-under-another on the other hill.
The piece-de-resistance was the "Huge Kicker" - a vast construction about 15ft high from base to lip with a deep gap below, before the slope continued - providing our landing spot...
With a depth (from lip to bottom of gap) of about 35ft, this was not a kicker to fall short of, or mess-up a take-off from...
 It is worth mentioning that Tom took first hit on the Huge Kicker, with the result that he somersaulted 60ft through the air before landing on his chest, just missing his head...
Unbelieveably, he walked away with only a stiff back and severe winding to show for it!
The 3rd kicker was the "Under Kicker" which ran across the fall-line, with the drop-in situated in the gap under the Huge Kicker, and the landing in a natural halfpipe depression which opened out into a face. This was the smallest kicker, but also the one with the least chance of injury in the event of an accident...
So we used up all the fresh snow after 3 days, and the landings became unuseable.
The elements have combined to make fantastic spring snow conditions over the last few days, with a perfect slushy texture - although in the afternoons it can be a little "grabby" and slow...
Hopefully I will be heading over to Nelson skatepark in the next week for some streetboarding action, so I will have news from there - and hopefully some more snow will fall..?
Until then - keep it tight...
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...more articles in the Article Archive...
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latest sk8 images...
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dom: 540 melon(Bos Vegas)
dom: 540 tailgrab(Wanaka)
dom: transfer air(Wanaka)
dom: tweak melon(Wanaka)
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latest travel images...
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DeLorean(Abbotsford)
other camper smash(Christchurch)
inside campervan 1(Canterbury)
inside campervan 2(Canterbury)
gondola from town(Queenstown)
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latest sk8 movies...
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"I Know" '07 movieBeware: 103Mb !!!
Wanaka'06 movieBeware: 587Mb !!!
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latest travel movies...
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temporary content loss
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