After re-watching the ol’ Blizzard of Ahhhs praying for the white to fill the hazard friendly haven of Chah-moan-knee, I was beaver keen and surely this would be the best winter ever!!

Meanwhile, back on Canada’s western front, the weather had turned biblical with record cold November in Whitehorse and record snow in Whistler. After growing a moustache for under my mouth and grabbing new pants I returned to find ol’ Cham in much the same condition as two months earlier. An early December dump allowed the resort to open and some snow to linger but the grass was still green with more snow desperately needed.

The holiday season multiplied the valley’s population by ten. Waves of Italians, Brits and Swiss shralp the piste. The touch-and-go off-piste bowls and couloirs were in their last wind loaded carnations of fresh. The always intense high altitude mountains remain scarcely populated. Boot-packing the hiking trail to the bar is again in fashion.

This damn weather is making the existence of a traveling ski bum even more unpredictable. Two years ago the drought hit Whistler. The weather is changing. Between the seventies and the nineties climate related catastrophes tripled (Economist World in 2007). Some head for new frontiers like China and Kashmir. The locals in Chamonix are not letting environment stand in the way of being extreme and have started kite-skiing. The para-ponters from summer have morphed with the skiers of winter. Floating over chairlifts and ski runs then bouncing off patches of pow; kite-skiing is everywhere. Even without a wing or fresh snow there is a lot of skiing in these mountains. C’est la vie. This is life. I can’t complain.

We burnt a ski on new years. Opposite the Grand Montets at the Shack it could have been September. A hippy jam session complete with dog and a newly christened Glaswegian ski bum. We sat outside around a small fire and talked about the fall in the present tense.

In town at the lavish 70’s décor apartment listening to drum and bass everything turned to new years. Even people ‘not doing anything tonight’ still danced till 4. The bar was shoulder to shoulder at 7 when we left in the rain.

The next day it started to snow. It snowed all night and the next day. On the second it took until after noon to get the main lifts going. The lineups were an hour long and the weather was still a blizzard. Then on the 3rd the weather lifted and we skied blue bird powder all day long.