Help me out a bit whistler folks!

scratchman

scratchman

Member
Hey everyone! Im going to be up at whistler from Jan 4-9th and im looking for a bit of help here. Im going up with my bro and two buddies from school and none of us have been up to whistler before. we are staying at the holiday inn sunspree in whistler village. i normally travel around quite a bit in the winter to CO and WY but this "real job" shit is putting damper on the skiing this year! So I want to make the most out of this trip! I am by NO means looking for anyones secret stashes or shit like that just some advise!
What are some spots we shouldent miss on WB? any particular places to avoid? steep, deep, cliffs, great trees, thats what i need! better places to party? not so great places?
Thanks for the help everyone!
 
Definitely ski Spanky's on Blackbomb, and the Peak Chair on Whistler. Avoid Symphony unless you are using it to hike Flute (it is avi controlled). And, if you do that, go first thing in the morning as crowds can get bad around noon (it also takes a while to get back over to the rest of the mountain). There is lots of good terrain to be found off Crystal if you look for it. Ski Blackcomb in low-light/snowy conditions and spend time on Whistler in the sun.

That is about as helpful as I can be without giving away secrets.
 
I would suggest picking a good inbounds spot and getting to know it a bit rather than trying to hit everything on both or even one mountain... peak chair is a good bet. You can venture over to harmony horseshoes from there and get some pretty good tree skiing down below. It's still up in the air how gem bowls will look in 2 weeks, so spanky's might be good or it might be a rocky maze of death and flat light, especially to the right. If that happens and you're on blackcomb you can always spend some time in the trees under Crystal chair... pretty hard to get bored there.
 
Get up early, aim for first load. Maximize your early hours because the mountain gets PACKED after 10:30-11 ish. Especially during holiday season. Eat lunch late, after 1 ish to avoid crowds.

I hate to say it, because I HATE HATE HATE that fucking book, but go find that little intermediate/advance terrain at W/B book, they sell it everywhere, at grocery stores and book stores. It has lots of info in it about where to go, and how link up some longer runs.

W/B can be daunting because it's so large, there's a lot of terrain to explore so pick an area like peak, or spanky's and do a few laps there, there's a lot to ski.

If you go out, pre-drink, the bar is ridiculously expensive, and keep in mind if it ever does snow and you want to ski, shut'r down early, because it'll be worth it to get up there early.
 
this might piss some people off, but I dont even care because the entire resort a) gets way less snow than resorts to the north or south of it... I think its at some wierd lattitude where the stroms from the north it too far north and miss it, and the storms from the south hit too far south and miss it. Forecast this weekend? Vancouver North Shore to get 20+, Baker to get 30, Whistler to get 4-5cm... This is a consistent trend. And when it does (rarely) snow a lot, these zones get tracked out ina few hours anyway (more or less). For these two reasons I dont care about giving away good zones. This image is of whistler... figure out and you'll have fun.

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aim for the terrain in the red circles.
 
Don't heed that advice, going out of bounds at Whistler is incredibly dangerous and time consuming. The mountain is big enough that its worth just skiing in bounds.

What not to miss on Whistler (my favorite)

If there's new snow get to the Gondola at least 20 min before it opens to stretch and get hyped. Bomb up that and then do a warm up on either the red chair or to Harmony. If you're looking to ski the Peak, best on a nice day, hit some trees under the Red CHair and scope future runs. THe run under the Red is great!

Peak and Harmony are where its at, on Harmony the Gun Barrells are a classic and super deep...Harvey's is fun if you traverse as hard right as possible into the trees to find snow when there isn't any elsewhere.

Peak, make it to West Bowl via XMas trees (unmarked) just traverse hard skiers left from Whistler Bowl up and over

Oh, if you time a pow day ski until you feel like the Peak or Harmony chair is 20-30 mins from opening then get in line
 
heh i'll b in whistler 2moro nite.

really stoked ... thanks for all the tips ... especially in the avalanche thread!
 
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