With the holidays upon us and 2016 quickly disappearing its time to look back an reflect on the year that’s been. When the powers that be asked for a year end TTR review of my favorite trip moments of 2016 I had to do some serious thinking, with most of our snowboard programs running for month on end it took some serious thought to try and come up with my favorite moments from 8 months spent with TTR crews. Here are some of my highlights from 2016.
We had a pretty low snow year in Banff last winter, some chalked it up to El Nino while others blamed global warming but either way that’s just the way it goes sometimes. We’re luckily at Lake Louise that even on a low year we still get everything opened and have an amazing snowpack but you never get as much pow as you would like regardless of where you do a season. The last day of our 11 week instructor course in March changed that real quick as we had a day lined up with Kpow cat skiing. For anyone unfamiliar with this activity you take a custom built snow groomer out into the backcountry and rip around in untracked pow all day long. We did it at Fortress Mountain which is actually an old abandoned ski resort here in Alberta that has become quite famous as film locations in some recent Leo Dicaprio movies. Having our last day as a group riding our own private resort covered in fresh snow was such a surreal experience, the place was essentially a ghost town and we were given the keys to the city. After laying waste to KPOW, we had our usual end of course awards celebration and I got to score tickets to an Offspring concert in Calgary, that was easily the best day on snow with the groups for the year.
TTR got me out of my comfort zone this year and pulled me out of the mountains to drop me on the beach for the Indonesia surf trip. This was a bit of a shock to the system as I went from snowboarding in May to 30 degree heat just 15 hours later. I’ve surfed, or at least flopped around with a board for years, but have never really gotten anywhere with it as its always been a few weeks here and there without any real guidance. All my surf trips prior to this were usually a bunch of snowboarders thinking that their skills would crossover really quickly, realizing that surfing is hard, getting frustrated and drinking rum for the rest of the time. Having Chris to give the technical know how and Max to keep the stoke alive helped me go from zero to what felt like hero real quick. I was amazed how far I came in with about 3 weeks of guidance from the crew. If anyone reading this is chasing winters all year you should call the boys for a little surf trip in-between, they’re definitely going to take you out of your comfort zone but you’re not going to be disappointed!
As cheesy as it sounds watching people step up through huge challenges it one of the best parts of these trips. On the recent Canada 4 week instructor I had a huge WTF moment when one of the snowboarders pulled me aside the evening before our first day of riding to inform me that he had never actually snowboarded before. While keeping a calm appearance on the outside my mind instantly start wondering what this dummy (I hope your reading this Harry) had going on inside his head. Not many people would see a sport on TV and think “ Oh that looks interesting, I should probably try to teach this totally foreign skill to others.” I strongly recommend against coming out for a course if you’re not at the minimum standards but Harry didn’t care. Sure enough the first day was pretty entertaining for us as. Harry assured us he would be fine so we took him right up the gondola to mess with the poor guy. Fast forward three weeks plus lots of extra lessons and Harry has totally turned his riding around and even got through the level 1 exam despite the odds against him, pretty proud of this guy but PLEASE no one else try Harry’s approach.
( Harry probably stacked it trying to get this shot……)
Sometimes doing this program is like the Christmas gift that just keeps giving and this year it was quite literal. 2 seasons ago I had this pipedream of getting some land in the mountains and farming alpacas whenever I decided to stop coaching fulltime. The group that was doing the TTR Canada instructor course spent a lot of time on snow with me and as a result had to keep listening to me go on about alpacas all winter. They loved it and actually got the group together to get me an Alpaca as an end of season gift. Now were talking an actual full sized live alpaca, his names Sutton and he lives here in Alberta on a farm with his alpaca buddies. So part of getting an alpaca means I get shipments of wool from Sutton which my mom has started turning into some kick ass sweaters, it looks like for the next 3 Christmases ill be getting alpaca product from my mom/the Banff TTR group. Its easily one of the most thoughtful gifts I have ever gotten.
It’s a pretty wild experience being so involved in programs like this where you get to share passions with a bunch of stoked clients. Thanks to all the groups who made 2016 an amazing winter, looking forward to passing the passion on to many more of you in 2017.
-Andrew