Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Bill Hawley. Born and raised seven minutes from the mountains in North Vancouver, I’m a new addition to the Grouse Park Blog and very grateful for it! As much as I’m new to the blog, I’m not so new to the mountain. I started skiing at Grouse when I was 3 years old and it just became the regular thing to do after school and on weekends. Things progressed from there and when I was about 12 years old, I picked up my parents little point and shoot camera, took a few pictures around the house to keep myself busy and that’s when I realized what I wanted to do for fun. Skiing and photography. Now, I’m finally starting to combine the two and it’s proving to be the most kick ass thing I know how to do.
So, now that you know who I am, don’t be shy if you see me up the mountain, I’m the guy wearing the bright blue jacket and pants looking like I shouldn’t be shredding the park. Come say hi and maybe strike up a conversation! The temperature’s dropping a little bit, so let’s be optimistic and say that’s a sign of snow on the way. Here’s some of my most recent shots to keep you stoked on the season, enjoy!
Park crew Adam Nicholls spinning the step down before the rain came
I’ve got some pretty hyped news for you. We’re opening up a contest for all you Grousepark.com faithfuls. The prize that you’ll be dueling for will be a day on the hill for you and three buddies with the Grouse Mountain Pro Team on Sunday, January 17th, as well as a prize pack for you from our sponsors. You could tell all your friends that you are now friends with not ONE pro, but multiple pros, thus making you the coolest cat on the block. How do you win? It’s pretty easy. There are three questions below. You need to send an email to contest@grousepark.com with correct answers for all three and we’ll put your name into a draw. The deadline to get your answers in is January 13th at noon. That gives you a week. We’ll announce the winner later that night. Please remember to mention your first and last name, as well as a telephone number that we can reach you at to set things up. So, without further ado, here are the questions. Get Google fired up!
1. In which team snowboard film did Chris Dufficy make his comeback and what was the movie called?
2. What was the trick that won the 2002 U.S. Open Big Air (skiing) and who won it?
3. Which North American resort was the first to allow snowboarding?
Every year, I aim to make a trip down to Mt. Baker right before Christmas. For those of you that have never been, I don’t know what’s wrong with you. Baker is one of Washington State’s most legendary mountains. The inbounds ski area is HUGE, with so many lifts, that there are never lift lines longer than 2 minutes. On any given day, you’re always bound to find a playground of powder somewhere on the mountain. If the inbounds terrain bores you, which it shouldn’t, you can always hike into the backcountry, given that you have a beacon, a shovel, are avalanche safety certified and a bunch of other things.
We left Vancouver bright and early, at 5:30 in the morning. Usually too early to be alive, I came up with the genius idea that instead of sleeping and struggling to wake up, I’d just stay awake till 5 in the morning. Needless to say, the drive there was a challenge (the drive home had it’s own pleasant situation. Ask me about it if you see me on the mountain, it’s a great story). In any case, we got to Baker at 9 am, after making a quick pit stop in Bellingham for a hearty breakfast at McDonald’s, where a super size meal actually means a super size meal. My buddy Charlie and I met up with Duke and Jordan, a couple Washington locals and hit up the mountain. There were freshies on the ground and not a cloud in the sky. It made for a perfect day of riding and was a nice break from the local skating rinks we’ve been riding. My words won’t do it justice, so here are a couple pictures that sum everything up.
Sunrise on Old Baker Highway
View from the parking lot
Looking back from the very top at Jordan
Mostly untracked going down
Short break when the legs started to feel like Jell-o
The active volcano itself
This is how close the backcountry is
I was riding a 150 Rome ArtifactSK 1985 the entire day. For those of you that haven’t tried reverse camber in powder yet, it’ll change your life. I’ve never had such a fun pow day in my life. That being said, if you getting into the deeper stuff, you probably don’t want a super soft jib board with reverse, but seriously, reverse camber is the beeeest. All in all, a great day with good friends and new friends. Get up there if you can, they still have midweek discount lift tickets, so try to get there between Monday and Friday.
Lastly, from all of us at Grouse Mountain Terrain Parks and Grousepark.com, we’d like to wish you and your families a super duper Merry Christmas. Hope you all had a good one!
After a lot of discussion over the past couple weeks, we here at Grousepark.com are excited to introduce the our 5 blogospondants for the 2010 season. It was hard narrowing it down to just 5 with the depth of applications we got this year. But, without further ado, here there are.
Alice Gorton
Eric Beckstead
Jason Macfarlane
Jeremy Cox
Richard Loat
I’m really excited to see what this season holds for these 5 bright, talented and young minds. If last year was good, our goal is to make this year fan-freaking-tastic, so you’ll want to keep your interwebs locked ongrousepark.com for all things board and ski related from people that live and breathe all things snow. Except for yellow snow, hopefully no one lives and breathes that.
You’ll be getting a short introduction from each of them in the upcoming week so let you know who they are. We have a bunch of locals, but some new faces to the Grouse Park scene as well. So, lady and gentlemen, welcome to grousepark.com. Strap in and kick it!
I’ve been getting a lot of questions regarding the 2009/2010 Blogospondent search. Actually, just one. Have the bloggers been picked yet? Here’s what’s been going on in the Grouse Mountain Batcave.
Firstly, we have successfully developed a fully functional Grousepark.com replica of the late 70’s Batmobile. No joke, it’s there. So don’t be surprised if you see parachutes in the parking lot. We’ve gotta slow this baby down somehow.
Naturally, with all the work involved in developing such a sensational vehicle, we’ve had little time to review and short list applicants. All jokes aside, Michelle Evans has been doing her best to get things moving, but she’ll be going on maternity leave in a mere three weeks (on my birthday, coincidentally), so understandably she’s got a lot on her plate. We are trying our best, currently, to get things sorted on Thursday and hopefully announce the next contestants on the Price is Right…er, Grousepark.com, by the end of this week.
So, sorry for the delay, we’re working on it, we promise! See below for one of the perks you get if you ARE chosen as a blogger.
Not even available in stores. Who says writing for Grousepark.com doesn’t pay off?
Here is a new edit from the boys at 4bi9. This recent edit was made while they were at Mt Hood’s West Coast Sessions, it is a spoof on HBO’s hit series “Eastbound and Down”. Check it out!
