Whistler, Opening Day On Blackcomb and Whistler Tweetup

November 26th marks the day that Blackcomb Mountain opens to the public. With more than a base of 200 cm for the opening, it was definitely a busy place.

I was invited up to Whistler/Blackcomb to attend the 1st #whistlertweeup, a get-together of Whistler locals who are part of the ever growing Twitter scene and of course who enjoy the snow. Though before I get into more about the actual tweetup, I did get the opportunity to check out the snow conditions on Whistler and Blackcomb. This was also my first time up this season and as I write this, I am still a little sore.

I arrived in Whistler Village at about 9 AM, picked up my lift ticket and headed for the Whistler Gondola. Up I went, the higher I got, the more snow I saw. When I arrived at the top, this is what Whistler Mountain looked like:

Not bad right? I strapped on my board and I tried to reassure myself,  ‘It is like riding a bike ‘, right?

After I finished a bunch of different runs, I headed over to the Roundhouse for some food. Relaxed and rested for a while. Checked Twitter, Facebook and other things on my iPhone, then popped over to Blackcomb via the Peak 2 Peak gondola.

The Peak 2 Peak has not been in operation for 1 complete year yet, but that is coming up soon (December 12th). If you haven’t checked out the Peak 2 Peak gondola you should! Not only is the 11-minute trip spectacular, it allows you to access either mountain without much effort!

Blackcomb was much busier than compared to Whistler. Being that it was opening day, the snow would be most likely untouched. Snowboarders definitely out numbered the skiers on this side. I walked around a bit and popped back over to Whistler.

After a few more runs, one which was cut a bit short due to a helicopter in the middle of it, it was time to head back down the mountain to attend the 1st Whistler Tweetup at the GLC (Garibaldi Lift Co).

There was a great turn out for the 1st Whistler Tweetup put on by @WhistlerBlckcmb, I would say there was at least 30 people who showed up to enjoy the great food, great conversation and great prizes that were to be given away. I myself won 2 DVDs; Sixes and Sevens as well as Outdoor Graduation. All I had to do was answer the simple question: What does GLC stand for? Yes, I did manage to spell Garibaldi wrong.

Some of the people who were in attendance were (in no particular order):

There were a lot more people and if I missed out putting you on the list don’t hate me! It was a fun event and I was glad I was invited up to attend it. Meeting new people, catching up with a couple I’ve met before too, I’m getting better at the Social part of Social Media. I am looking forward to attending more Whistler tweetups and events as well as meeting new people!

On a side note, I managed to use my Sigma EF-530 DG Super flash a few times. Bounced it off the ceiling and scaled the power down by 1/3. Though it seems even then it might have been too much. I also noticed that at times the flash didn’t want to fire. I’m still trying to work out why it wouldn’t go off even if the settings were like 1/60 at ISO 200, but even at 1/150 ISO 200 it didn’t fire, weird eh? Perhaps someone out there might give me some insight into that. The flash was set to Manual as I was shooting in Manual. Oh well! Practice makes perfect right?

See you next Tweetup!