Date: 04/08/12
Weather: Clear
Location: Broken River
Group: Watson Green, Jeromy Black, Eric van den Broeke, Ben Solit, Liam Hayward and myself
Duration: 1 day
Snow conditions: untracked melt freeze.
Incidents: slipped a disk in my spine after a bad tumble down a narrow chute.
Been waiting for snow for the last two weeks and finally it came. after 20 cm of fresh and a slight bit of rain set up for a awesome day. the sun was out early and so were we getting up the mountain by 9.30 Sunnys was nice and soft. i lined up a few drops and started flying down the mountain as the day went on my back started feeling good so i threw a few Lincon loops landing 2 of 4. in the afternoon the ridge tow was opened and my second run down I dropped into a tight chute. the snow up top was hard and i started heading down with speed then hit a soft patch mid turn sinking and tumbling down the chute i twisted awkwardly and once again slipped a disk. getting down from there was a painful exercise that took far to long and don't ever want to have to do that again. the morning was sick but the day came to an unfortunate end and will be a few weeks before ill be back on the skis.
Patrol Weekend
Date: 21/07/12 - 22/07/12
Weather: Overcast
Location: Broken river
Group: Owen Lee and myself
Duration: 2 days
Snow conditions: hard!!! lots of death cookies
went up for patrol after a big rain event to find the main basin basically destroyed. Tussocks and rocks everywhere and super solid snow. Saturday there was 80 people on the field but nothing much happened only had one restart on the rugby so the day was filled with lots of skiing. sunday was much quieter with only 14 people coming up so there wasn't much to do again. It was sad to see the basin so empty and I will be dreaming of snow this week.
Broken river Week
Date: 31/06/2012 - 06/07/2012
Weather: the first 4 days were clear. rain on the fifth day followed by clear again
Location: Broken River Ski Club, Craigieburn Valley Ski Area
Group: Eric van den Broeke, Jeremy Hunt, Ben Solit and Myself
Duration: 7 days.
Snow Conditions: soft for 4 days then rain and clearing froze the snow solid and hard conditions
Great to be back at home. good conditions the first few days meant a few small hucks eyed up a few for after the next snow. A kicker was built and we ended up throwing lincon loops, 360s, 540s, back flips and flat spin 360s landing my first 540 and lincon loop still not quite landing any flat 360s a but getting a better understanding. over all a sick week up on the mountain good to get back into it once again.
thanks to Ben Sollit for the photos.
Opening Day
Date: 30/06/2012
Weather: Clear
Location: Temple Basin
Group: Greg Lee, Phil Palzer, Rata Lovell-Smith, Sara Dwyer, Conor Livesey, Jeromy Black, Alice Payn, Ru Kraal, Watson Green and Myself.
Duration: 1 day
Sick day up at temple with the flat mates and some of the first years spent most of the day playing around on Cassady tow. in the afternoon hit a kicker that some one had built threw a few back flips and decided to try a Flat 360 and got really close to landing one a few times. But came out just short on my last attempt and tweaked my shin so stopped there for the day.
thanks to Jeremy Black and Conor Livesey for photos.
Back Flip
Flat 360.
Mt Hutt
Date:
Weather: Clear
Location: Mt Hutt
Group: Jeremy Black, Conor Livesey, Eric van den Broeke, Robbert van den Broeke.
Duration: 3 days
Incidents: landing flat put my knee into my face
went up to hut for 3 days and got used to being on skis again. on the first day i spotted a cliff that looked good to go but the landing was quite flat and the snow was hard. decided that being the first day i needed to drop of something decent so i dropped it. landed hard but skied out. the next day i hit it twice more. Second hit I caught my ski on the take off and landed on my side. The third hit I hit it with to much speed and overshot my landing. I landed very flat and hard and put my knee into my cheek. I left it at that and just had a ski round.
Thank you to Jeremy Black for the photo.
My first cliff of the season.
Last weekend of the Season
Date: 14th - 16th October
Weather: Snowing with Clear spells
Location: Broken river
Group: Liam Heyward, Eric van den Broeke, Jeromy Hunt and Ollie Hunt.
Duration: 3 Days
Incidents: went up the ridge with no transceiver and sloughs were being triggered all over the ridge, Landed on my head trying a 360 because i accidentaly went corked
I came up on Friday night to find there was about 20 cm of fresh and night skiing was on so i quickly put my gear on and went up the Rugby tow was mostly tracked but the snow was still sick so i skied for 4 hours and then went to bed ready for the next day Saturday was awesome we quickly tracked out the main tow and headed up the ridge tow once it cleared unfortunately Barrett one of the patrollers had set off a large slough down Margots Gulch and most of the ridge was unstable and coming down without a transceiver was not the best thing to do but i made it down with out to much trouble. on Sunday everything had cleared up and the ridge had been opened so we quickly tracked as much as we could before the snow became to sticky. in the afternoon we hit a big jump that Dan had pushed up on Friday morning and some guys were spinning off it doing under flips, 540s and 720s mostly landing with the occasional crash i wanted to try some cork 720s later in the afternoon but everything had become to sticky and it wouldn't have been a good idea to try more. this weekend summed up a great season happy to have had one more powder day and cant wait for next season.
Ski Patrol
Date: 8th - 9th October
Weather: Snow clearing to fine light to no winds
Location: Broken river Ski field
Duration: 2 days
Key learning: telling snow boarders to keep their snow board on rather than walking on slick snow
Incidents: a snow boarder took his board of and dropped it down Avalanche basin
another weekend up at broken river patrolling. Saturday there were not many people and the snow was horrible so there wasn't much to do. On Sunday 181 people came up so i spent 3 hours on the access platform instructing people on how to use rope tows. The last person of the day went up and fell off at the second pulley and decided to take off his snow board and walk down. He dropped his board and it took off down into Avalanche basin so he went down to look for it and was given a refund. in the afternoon everyone had left and there was only patrollers and a few of my mates so i took my radio off for 1 hour and went and tried some more cork 720s my first attempt i landed on my face but my second attempt i almost landed but my ski came off as i landed and my third attempt i came up short and ended up doing a cork 540 and crashing.
Ski Patrol
Date: 1st - 2nd October
Weather: Rain on Saturday clear Sunday
Location: Broken River
Duration: 2 Days
Key Learning: none
Incidents: none
A cool weekend patrolling conditions on the Saturday were not so great due to the rain but Sunday was awesome conditions the rain had made everything smooth and it had softened up by about 10.00 am so great skiing all day.
Broken river
Date: 29th August
Weather: Cloudy periods mostly fine.
Location: Broken river
Group: Liam Heywood, Jeromy Hunt, Eric van den Broeke, Ben sollit, Dan Innes and me
Duration: 1 day
Key learning: Setting the rotation for Cork 720s
Incidents: Tried a Cork 720 and under rotated and snapped my pole. Another attempt at a cork 720 of a much larger jump with much less kick i under rotated and landed directly on my face.
Another awesome day up at broken river trying different rotations again still just not getting the Cork 720s but i will keep trying hopefully landing a few before the end of the season.
Ski Patrol
Date: 17th - 18th September
Weather: Fine
Location: Broken River
Duration: 2 Days
Key Learning: Helping people ride tows
Incidents: None
A cool weekend it was my first weekend ever of patrolling. The first time trying to start the main was a bit difficult i had the speed set wrong so it wouldn't start, but i figured it out quick. The rest of the weekend went smoothly. Over all a sweet weekend up and i really enjoyed patrolling
Broken River
Date: 20th - 21st August
Weather: Fine
Location: Broken River Ski Field
Group: Liam Heyward, Eric Van Den Broeke, Peter Scriven, Joseph Lang, Ben Solit
Duration: 2 days
Key Learning: Flat spin 360, Cork 720, Cork 540, Front flips, dropping into a steep line with no visibility
Incidents: My second attempt at a front flip i went to big and landed flat resulting in me putting my knee into my face again! it ripped the skin on my chin open about 1 cm.
An absolutely insane weekend on the field it started on Monday with the start of the huge! low system coming from the south east pushing its way up the country dropping snow every where in New Zealand Including Auckland which hasn't seen snow in 80 years. This weekend was building up to be huge with 85 CM of fresh! dumped all over the alps. I was so pumped on Saturday we headed off ready for the awesome weekend to follow. as we set off we saw crazy amounts of snow around, the devils punchbowl falls frozen over, the Waimakariri river bed just a field of snow and the temperature sitting on -10. finally getting up there and seeing Peter and Joesph trying front flips and we thought we should also started trying Front flips, Lincoln loops, Flat spin 360s my first attempt ended up with me opening up on take off stopping my rotation mid way and i landed on my head the second one i over rotated and almost landed a cork 540 so i threw it harder and got so close to landing a cork 720 so i continued trying just falling over each time just short of landing the others were throwing all sorts of rotations until we were so sore we could barley walk. Saturday was a different weekend usually after a big storm system comes through we start skiing big lines and hucking huge it was a good change but Sunday was a different storey. The Remarkables were always known to me and my friends as a super gnarly face and the few times we had seen it skied were in deep snow with stable conditions and someone guiding them with radio contact so today seemed like the best day to try it. The 3 of us Liam Hayward, Eric van den Broeke (my brother) and I set off 9:00 am sharp stopping at the stair way to heaven to do our last scouting before we were out of view of the face we all decided on the same line because we had never skied a face where you cant see what you are dropping into so we picked a line that was easy to find from the top and you couldn't mess up. The walk up took about an hour and a half we had to keep stopping and looking over the edge to try and get some idea of where we were when we finally made it we put on our skis and skied the last bit along the ridge giving me and Liam a decent sized core shot each we stood on top of the face and decided who was going first i quickly volunteered to go first and set off down the knee deep snow. once we were on the face it was surprising how flat the face was looking from the other side it looked crazy but on the face it was a lower angle then expected. The entire trip took about 2 hours all up and i am looking forward to the next storm so i can go and ski it again.
Ski Patrol Training
Date: 13th August
Weather: Fine
Location: Broken River Ski Field
Group: i came up with Kelly. The Training was with Owen, Mark, Emily, Whitey and Me and we were taken by Chris Fisher and Doug
Duration: 1 Day
Key Learning: Skiing with Toboggans, Snow pits, compression test, Extended compression test.
Incidents: None
An interesting day we spent the morning with Chris Checking our Ski skills followed by learning to use the toboggans. in the afternoon we were taken by Doug and he showed us around the patrol room and showed us the avalanche plan and taught us about snow safety. later he had us dig a snow pit and told us about different layers and snow types he also showed us a few stability tests and told us about other tests that can be used. overall a great day i learnt lots about snow safety and snow pack and am looking forward to my patrol days.
Temple Basin
Date: 12th August
Weather: Cloudy low down the top half of Downhill tow was clear. clearing afternoon
Location: Temple Basin
Group: Kelly and me
Duration: 1 day
Incidents: did a 3 back flips landed on my head on the second attempt only had a bit of a stiff neck after
A cool day at Temple saw group 2 on their mountain trip they pressured me to try a back flip i ended up caving in to the peer pressure I landed the first one and crashed the second. later in the day i headed up to lower Bills a few times the snow was patchy with large pockets of wind blowen powder in areas. the last run of the day i threw another Back flip with way more speed and rotated slower and landed it perfectly which i was stoked with a perfect way to finish the day.
Temple Basin
Date: 31st July
Weather: Fine
Location: Temple Basin
Group: Andy, Adrian, Chris H, Todd, Robbie, Greg and Me
Duration: 1 Day
Incidents: hit a large drop, I back slapped and bounced but i was OK and kept skiing but it could have gone wrong easily
An awesome day Bills Basin was still loaded with fresh tracks every where i hit a big drop on the traverse out i didn't land but i will try it again later in the season. decided to ski down the walking track today due to the previous days adventure it all went smoothly and i really enjoyed my day.
Temple Basin
Date: 30th July
Weather: Fine
Location: Temple Basin
Group: Chris H, Chris E, Kerain, Adam, Todd, Grace, Richard, Kelly, Damion, Greg, Daniel, Robbie and Me
Duration: 1 day
Incidents: Grace, Greg, Damion and I tried to ski out on the SE facing slope to the Goods lift but the Conditions were very different to the main basin and became very icy and there was a large 20-30 m bluff face below us by the time we realised the conditions were so bad it was to late to go back so we had to push on we carefully made our way down if we had fallen it would be highly likely that we would have gone off the bluff. at one point we had to side slip the hole way down and Grace had out her ice axe out finally we made it out very relived.
A great day skiing Grace, Kerain and I hiked up to bills basin twice which was loaded with 10 to 20 cm of fresh in areas. then in the afternoon i gave Dan a Lesson and he picked it up incredibly fast. overall it was a great day and i will be more careful about where i ski and if i do ski in a no fall zone i will take more experianced people.
First Tech Holidays
Date: 13th - 23rd July
Weather: white out 3 days, clear 8 days
Location: 5 days Temple Basin, 6 days Broken River.
Group: Greg Lee, Grace Flemming, Phil Palzer, Rata Lovell-Smith, Kelly Donnelly, Jarrad Mathews, Kerian Chandler, Chris Harvey, Ollie Hunt, Liam Heyward, Dan Innes, Eric Van Den Broeke, Ned Greenfield, Moss Greenfield, Mark Greinfield, Andy Hall, Ben Sollit, Robbert Van Den Broeke and me (probably others to i just don't remember)
Duration: 11 days
Incidents: Hit a drop and landed flat putting my knee into my jaw. Hit another drop also landing flat but from higher up also putting my knee into my face resulting in a black eye. hit a big drop and crashed hitting my elbow on my nutcracker. elbow swelled up and became stiff.
A great start to the season starting with a day at Temple Basin which was white out but still a good warm up day the next few days were clear and had great snow. i attempted a few Back flips (only landed 2) did a few small drops and a few hiking missions one to the ridge line just below Mt Cassidy. the second week my dad payed for a weeks accommodation in White star lodge at Broken River Ski field. It was good to be skiing at my home Field again i had a great week there hitting a few small drops then on Saturday my Friend Liam said he wanted to find some big new drops, there was one i was eyeing up but i wanted more snow first. I showed him expecting him to have the same view except i hear, "Shit thats perfect im going to do it now." so i kinda had to do it too so we were both standing on the top and he hit it first and crashed hard. so i was left on top thinking shit if he crashed im probably going to crash to. But i had to do it now so i sent it landed hard backslapped bounced then double ejected and rolled a few meters with a sharp pain in my elbow but i was stoked the first big cliff of the season unfortunatly not landed.
Photos will be up soon (the people who have them are still skiing)
Ski Patrol Training
Date: 25th-26th June
Weather: Overcast/fine
Location: Broken River
Group: Me, Grace , Matt , Hanah , Emily, Owen, Louise, Mark, James, Charlie, Whitey, Dan
Incidents: None
Great to be back up on the ski field even though there in no snow its just good to be hanging out with skiers again we started off learning radio calls and the 10 codes we then went up and had a look at the tow shed and trip boxes and the patrol room we headed down and had dinner and talked about skiing and Broken River for ages. The second day we headed up and learnt how to operate the tow, reset trip boxes, remote start, bypass gates, first aid scenarios and Transceiver searches with no snow so it took less than a minute to find. we then went down cleaned the hut and headed back to Greymouth. Hopefully it snows soon
Broken River: 2010 Season
Date: 3rd July - mid October
Days: 60+
Location: Broken river
Group: Me, Lachie Pollack, Liam Heyward, Dan Innis, Ollie Hunt, Jeromy Hunt, Tamiki Green, Rose Sutherland, Eric Van Den Broeke
Incidents: None
A great season i was out of work at the end of the year. i made alot of progress this year pushed myself much more managed to do more big drops and also learnt to backflip which caused alot of pain a two minor concusinons and minor whiplash and difficulty breathing but didn't stop me to much defiantly a great season looking forward to next season. I want to learn a misty 540 and work towards a cork 540 or 720and also work on strait 540s
Thanks to Trudi Dickson for the Photos
My first Backflip attempt (LANDED!!!)
Chill Big mountian Competition
Date: Unknown 2010
Location: Temple Basin
Group: Friends from Broken River and many others
Weather: 130mm of rain fell the day before so we had a field full of slop
Snow condition: first day sloppy snow second day very hard pack
Incidents: Ski pre-released on my first run just above my drop at speed almost slid off my drop on my side
good to enter a Big mountain comp for once even though i did horribly first run was a DNF and my second run i took the wrong drop which was only 2m into a field of death cookies so i came last overall but next year i will pick my skiing up and try enter junior Nats for the last year i can.
Trampoline Training
Date: 2009 and 2010 summers
Location: QEII Park Gymnastics
Group: Me, Lachie Pollak, Liam Heyward, Arron, Jeromy Hunt, Eric Van Den Broeke.
Incidents: None
During the summer in Christchurch We go to the tramps to learn rotations so far i have lernt misty 540s i still cant get misty 720s but i managed to do a few Cork 720s and one Cork 540. frontflips and backflips cant wait to be able to do them on skis.
Porte Du Soleil
Date: 19th - 26th December 2009
Location: Porte Du Soleil, France/ Switzerland i stayed in Champoussin and visited Champery, Les Crosets, Morgins on the Swiss side and Chatel, Avoriaz, Morzine, Les Gets and Montriond.
Group: Me, my uncle Taco, my Aunt Marleen, and 7 year old cousin Tjitske.
Weather: most days clear but high wind on the tops and POWDER!!! for 7 days straight
Incidents: None
Back in 2009 my mum sent me off to Holland to see my family and go to school there for a month. But the coolest part of it all is i got to go skiing in Switzerland and France for a week with my uncle and aunt. We were up at some ridiculous hour in the morning trying to get all the ice and snow off the car that had formed over night, then off we went heading in to a giant storm that had just passed over us that night. By about 5:00 pm we finally made it through intense snow covered roads and huge traffic jams and arrived at the hotel in the beautiful village of Champoussin. My uncle and aunt were relieved to be at the hotel but i just couldn't wait to go skiing the huge storm that had just passed over most of Europe had covered the whole mountain in at least 30 CM OF FRESH POWDER. the next morning i was up at 6am ready for the first day of skiing but everyone else had other ideas (sleep). Finally we got out and i quickly went out and began lapping the ungroomed runs before anyone else had a chance to but buy the time it was 12:00 only 3 others had started skiing the powder runs. Turns out in Europe most people don't like powder they prefer the groomed slopes. The next few days flew by so fast i spent most of the days flying through the trees jumping off any thing that looked cool by the second to last day the wind had eased of so it was off to France me my aunt and uncle took the bus over to Champery and began our long day trip we got to the top of a peak that stood at 2277m and began the long trip down to the next village Montriond it was by far the longest run i have ever done it took roughly 30-45 min to get there weaving through the slower skiers and borders and cutting off for the odd patch of inviting looking powder and cool drops. Once we got there we stopped and had the most epic pancakes ever and began exploring the vast area of Port Du Soleil. This trip was by far the best Christmas ever and the most fun skiing i have ever done and can't wait to go again. Thanks Mum.
Thanks to Taco Tromp for the photos
Map Of Portes Du Soleil
Best Xmas EVER!!!
