Welcome to Whistler

After a pit stop in London town, which turned out to be just over a week of running around like a headless chicken (buying Christmas presents, getting a winter wardrobe, trawling through 3 months of post, completing the resulting life admin, trying to see as many people as humanly possible etc etc etc) I was heading off again. This time to the snowy peaks of the British Columbia Coast Mountain Range (nope we are not in the Rockies here), and more specifically Whistler village.
Journey over was pretty standard except the fine folk at my least favourite airline screwed up again and after making me repack 3 times at T5, because they seemingly don't know their own baggage rules, finally broke my case..... Luckily the gaffer tape held, everything arrived in tact, the Canadians let me in, and the driver was waiting on my arrival to whisk me along the "sea to sky" highway to my new home for the next 4 months. Living in a really rather nice townhouse, right by the village, with my friend Claire from Val D'Isere, and 9 others.... we even have our own chalet boy! There is a good mix of people (as well as me and Claire we have 2 Aussie boys, a Belgian guy, 3 British guys, a couple and one other girl) and everyone is getting on well, so far. If the idea for the "Come Dine with Me" house competition comes to fruition though this may well change....... can't resist the urge to show off my competitive streak! Although judging by the state of the meringue I attempted on Sunday we should hold off on a house bake-off for the foreseeable future and I should be content with my status as queen of the monopoly board.
Whistler is nice too, but the village is so different to the ski villages in the European Alps. There are 3 Starbucks, a MaccyDs and a KFC here for a start! What it lacks in charm though it makes up for in functionality, although I would prefer a bit of both to be honest. I have actually been really surprised at how American everything is... it really is a "have a nice day" culture, with drives throughs, big cars and big portions.
Saying that there are some excellent restaurants here and in my first week Claire and I met up with some of my London friends, who were out here on holiday, for dinner at Rim Rock....amazing oysters, fish, wine and desserts, we just need to start saving again for our next visit.
The mountain itself is great, so many trees, I just need to avoid being eaten alive by a tree well. My instructor informed me of the dangers of tree wells last week, within 15 minutes I had head butted a tree, inadvertently hugged a pine, and was left straddling a sappling rather inelegantly after accidently getting air. Mountain mishaps abound and only on Sunday did I almost head down the men's half pipe during the X-games qualifier. My instructors course starts on Monday which will hopefully iron out these little faux pas.
Hopefully by Monday we'll see a rise in temperatures too, last night fell to 34 degrees celsius below, far too chilly, and during the day one sock froze to the inside of my ski boot, maybe a sign to invest in boot heaters.... although I have always maintained that those are for whimps. Plenty of snow though, so shouldn't complain and my new skis (All mountain Fischer Koa 84) are looking good and working well.
I am enjoying "resting", catching up with the old faces from last season and sleeping far too much (can't blame the jet lag anymore though). I think I have almost slowed to the point of going backwards (much to Claire's annoyance!), so next week, once I have got over the lergie I have acquired, I am picking up the pace again. I haven't been totally lazy though and I have managed a few lessons on the mountain so far and a day trip down to Vancouver.
Enjoying the nightlife too; although the après doesn't match up to that of the alps I am quite a fan of the cool 80s music at Tommy Africa's on Mondays.... more on evening entertainment next time as we are about to start our house lesson on how to wax your skis. What fun!