Tales from the Adventure of Life: Day 8: Vancouver (Cypress Mountain)

I forgot how annoying Canada is. I have a huge pocket full of change since they have both dollar and two dollar coins. I also forgot how great Canada is. I never get IDed (how do you spell it?) when ordering alcohol. I also forgot how cool it is to go to a skiing and hear 8 different languages being spoken.

Anyway, I wake up this morning and still have a vague feeling that I am rocking on a boat. This is going to make sleeping tonight interesting since skiing tends to make me wake up in the middle of the night with the feeling that I am flying down the hill uncontrollably. I don't know why but it does and I really don't mind. So it will be an out of control skiing/rocking on a boat combo feeling. This should be intense.

I am freezing when I wake up. So I decide to take a hot shower. I turn it up as hot as it will go and step in. I immediately recoil from the steaming water as pain shoots through my foot. It is way too hot. I am actually quite impressed with how hot the water is here. I shower at a normal temperature and get dressed in my awesome new ski gear. My new pants feel weird since they are actual women's pants and are somewhat fitted. I mean they look awesome and fit fine but I am concerned that I am not going to be able to move in them to ski. I stop thinking about my pants and open my door to leave and am greeted by my complimentary newspaper. Awesome! Sadly, I don't have time to read it. Maybe tomorrow I will bring it to breakfast and read day old news somewhere.

I hit the road and look for a McDonald's. In the case that I can't cook myself breakfast prior to skiing, a McMuffin and OJ is an acceptable substitute. I take off down the road since I had seen one when driving around the other day. I drive until nothing looks familiar anymore. Just as I am about to give up, I spot one on the other side of the road. I swerve into the left hand lane and make the turn in. I order a number 1 and look at the screen. "Hot drink required" it says. I already had coffee this morning. I don't want more. I want orange juice. The lady is having enough trouble understanding me anyway so I just say "latte". Then she starts asking me if I want skim or 2% milk. What?!?!? I say skim and finally get to pull forward. I get my food and my coffee and no OJ. Apparently the milk was for the coffee.

I head to the mountain, which is only 15 minutes from the hotel. The drive up is a 15 mile switchback road with beautiful views of the Vancouver. I reach the ski area and am directed to a parking place as far away from the lodge as possible. It's busy. Not only is it a Saturday, but it has also snowed overnight for the first time in a while. I throw on the rest of my gear, grab my skis, and head to the lodge to buy my lift ticket. I get my ticket and head to the nearest lift. I make it to the top, excited at the promise of powder. While I am finally at the level that I can just pick a run and be able to handle it regardless of its difficulty, the first run or two are always a little shaky. I pick a blue run to warm up. I make it 5 meters (I am in Canada so I will use the appropriate measurements) down the hill before hitting an icy spot and eating it. As my body twists around and slides down the ice, my concerns about my pants are alleviated. I can move just fine in them. After that, I picked my path a little more carefully to avoid the ice and all was well.

Cypress Mountain is about the size of 5 Hilltops put together. It isn't much taller and the lifts aren't much longer. However, it is a lot wider and has 8 times the runs and much more challenging terrain. It has 6 lifts I think. Two for the bunny hill, three from various points at the bottom, and one from midway.(this one was closed) I make my way around the 3 bottom lifts. The last one can only be accessed by skiing to it and has no line. Most of the runs are black or double black so I decide this is a good place to ski for a while. I make a few runs on it. Regardless of how I approach from the top, I keep ending up on the same not so interesting run. I see other people on much cooler looking runs and am baffled as to how they got there. I ride the lift up once again and stop by a closed area to take some pictures. The views are amazing when the clouds clear. As I am standing there, I see people ducking under the rope and riding down the closed area. I am getting pretty tired of doing the same blue run so I decide to follow them. The run is amazing. Nice and steep and still some powder left. It does have some tracks so apparently a lot of people have done this. Near the bottom, I find a few small exposed rocks. This is probably the reason that it is closed. I fugitivly approach the ski lift the attendant sees me coming from the direction where there are no open runs and says nothing. Sweet! I hop on the lift and head to the top again to do some more closed runs. This is where all the black and double black runs are hidden and it would seem that no one cares at all that people are skiing all over the closed runs. After doing a number of illegal runs, I decide I am thirsty and head to the lodge for some water. I head back out and do a few more runs on each of the lifts. I get really sick of one lift because there is no one regulating the singles line and people are too stupid to organize themselves into groups of 4 to get on the lift. The last time I rode it, this group of 5 guys decides to go in the singles line because they think it will be faster. They finally get to the front of the line and run into their buddy who was a few groups back. So they wait for their friends and everything gets all fucked up. We have groups of 2, groups of 3, groups of 5, and not one group of 4. Some guy starts yelling at me to run (in my skis, which I can't do at all) up to the front of the line to hop on with one of the groups of 2. I stumble through the crowd and get to the lift. I am extremely frustrated with people's inability to handle such a simple task. Anyway, the skiing and most of the random people I rode the lift with are great. By about 5, my legs have had enough so I head back to the truck.

Someone was brilliant. Along the side of the entire parking lot, there is a path that you can ski on coming directly from the mountain. I ski all the way back to my truck. I load up and head back to the hotel.

Since it's Saturday, I decide to get a nice dinner. Before doing that, I shower. While in the shower, I notice that my conditioner is lathering like shampoo. What is going on??? So I look at the bottle (this is the same bottle I have been using at home for a month or so now) and notice it is shampoo. I haven't been conditioning my hair at all for months now. I have been shampooing it twice. I guess that explains why it had gotten so dried out. I really can't believe that I didn't notice this until now. Anyway, I go to an uneventful dinner and have a steak and some local beer. It was delicious.

I take the long way (outside/scenic way) back to my room. Unfortunately, I can't actually see anything pretty since it is snowing again. I consider trying to find a bar and meeting some new people. However, it is 7 and no bar is going to be interesting at this time. Also, I have been to the bar after skiing before and I am always too tired to be any fun whatsoever. In addition, I think I have had enough of bars from the ferry. It was fun but the peace and quiet last night was amazing. I decide bars are an overall bad idea and go back to my room to plan tomorrow and write this.