The trip to Sunshine Village

Steve, Me, Matt before departing for Sunshine
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Today before work I finally got the chance to take photo's of the museum and especially the Jamaican bobsleigh. The shuttle times for work is so ridiculously scheduled that it makes me needing to catch the shuttle 2 to 3 hours early to get to work because they are the last shuttles before my start times. Which is why I have so much time on hand to kill before work. I usually go to the gym at work, which is also free but today I decided to go and take some snaps at the winter olympic museum here at C.O.P.  Some of the stuff in here was quite interesting like all the torches and all the sports uniforms that they wore back in 1988 and the Australian one as well, gosh that looked so daggy and out of date like Austin Power days. But the thing that thrilled me the most was the Jamaican Bobsleigh, although I couldn't sit in it, it was enough to touch it. There were some old equipment they used in the old days and stuff as well. Also there was a video game of ice hockey where you actuall get to hit the puck onto a screen with a keep in front which was pretty cool. Which I tried to slam a few pucks in with a hockey stick and I have figured out that I suck at it so what I did was throw them at the screen and scored full points. Hahaha. So 15 minutes through the museum and I was done taking snaps and slamming pucks so it was work time and tomorrow heading off to Sunshine Village.

Rockies view from Bus
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So since this blog is short I've decided to add my venture to Sunshine Village in this entry as well. Sunshine Village is a mountain in the Canadian Rockies, it's between Banff and Lake Louise, takes about a 2 hour bus ride up there. So with 4 hours of sleep again because of the evening shift and going out for a few short drinks afterwards to the College Liberty Lounge. I was up at 5.30am and ready to go to Matt and Steve's house, we all had the day off together so we decided to head up to Sunshine. I packed like 6 bread rolls filled with Ham and Cheese and shoved them into my bag. Took my snowboard and my new gloves and new helmet and also a new face mask to try out for the day. Then off we went to catch a bus into town then walked a couple blocks to the Westin Hotel. Which is wear the Sunshine Coach was to pick us up from. It wasn't too cold only -5 but I still wore some long johns and a thermal top under my my board pants a tee-shirt and a jacket that work and given me. Once the bus came we threw all our boards on board and we were off for a ride, it wasn't too packed on the bus so everyone had their own 2 seats to sleep on. Once the bus took off I was dead asleep and knocked out for a bit over an hour then when I got up I saw huge mountains with real xmas trees everywhere surrounding us on the left side and the right side. It was just magnificent. And that is when I immediately snapped out of my sleep and go the camera out to take some photos. The rockies were massive with millions of xmas trees all planted on it and just imagining the scale of it I compared a xmas tree to the rest of the mountain and it was like having an Ant and you beside it.

Rockies View 2
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Well once we got to Sunshine we quickly slipped on our gear went on the gondola ride for about 15 minutes and started boarding our day away. There were massive amounts of snow and it had already been snowing the last couple days and it was still snowing. This is Canadian natural snow, soft powder up to your knees. It was like New Zealand snow but like 10 times more of it. But it was pretty cold going down the mountain, especially if you had exposed skin. Which is why I bought a face mask and I tell you what I look like a ninja and every snow photo I get of myself you probably won't be able to recognise me since I'm covered up so badly but just take my word, it's me and I'm in Canada okay. There is also a chairlift that you can take on the mountain which will lead you pass the Alberta boarder and into the BC province so you're actually crossing provinces. The runs at Sunshine was really wide and powdery some of it was a bit icy as well but I had a blast. Riding powder is really different to riding slushy snow, in some case it takes more effort because if you stop in powder you just sink and then have to unclip your bindings and then dig yourself out again.  But the most fun I had was jumping off like a 5 foot drop off. The first time I did it I just launched myself into the air and stuffed the landing up and rolled a couple times but the powder was soft enough to not break anything. The second time I nearly stuck the landing but still didn't quite get there. But it was so awesome. My riding is getting better, at C.O.P they have finally finished the 3 storey half pipe and the terrain park which looks pretty hardcore. I'm yet to give it a crack but at the moment I'm just riding switch when I'm at C.O.P and I'm getting better at it. So once I master that I'm going to hit the rails and jumps. But the end of the day at Sunshine Village there was a nice long run back down the mountain which took me about 30 minutes to complete. I had to occassionally stop a few times because my quads became so sore like I was trying to hold squats as long as I could before giving up. They were burning. It was probably because that I had a massive leg workout 2 days before as well which my muscles were still trying to recover from. By the end of it all my body was aching and pain was screaming from my body. But on the bus again and off we went back home and I slept the whole way through. I don't think I snored but there were some dirty looks people were giving me when I was looking around. Anyhow who cares. Next week I have 3 days off so I plan to meet up with Jenny who I met in Vancouver who is now working at Lake Louise so I'm planning to stay with her for a couple of nights and check out Lake Louise and Banff, snowboarding or partying I guess.