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RipCurl Photo shoot
Posted by finch | Filed under Uncategorized
RipCurl shoot at Mt Cook
The first week in NZ, the rains and low tide (not much snow) were getting us down. We knew we only needed a little more altitude to reach the good snow. Rumors were that the rain didn’t affect Mt. Cook, so we took our chances.
With a nice 3-day window, we were looking for one day on the Tasman glacier and another in the helicopter. Both days were gorgeous and snow was all time. Our timing couldn’t have been better. The first day in the ski plane was a pretty darn rad experience. Snow was deep so the pilot had to do a downhill landing before touching down for good, with an uphill landing. The crisp cold air was perfect for hiking back uphill in deep snow in to the open crevice field. The guide is there to make sure we don’t fall into any cracks or holes and make sure we stay off possible weak snow bridges. This open crevice field really creates some fun freestyle features with drops, wind lips, wall rides, 1/4pipes and more depending on the day. The ice is always moving so features are always changing. My favorite feature was a wall ride over this big icy hole that flowed right into a wind lip hip. The pilot on the way down always gives you your moneys worth by hugging the hanging glaciers and shooting the gaps on the ridges.
Heli day was what we had really been looking forward too. The Helicopter Line brought in an extra heli that day from Quennstown because they had so many crews to shuttle that day. Nicolas Muller and Kazu were their with Burton crew, which we got to witness Muller just destroy a run with a massive cab 5 off a natural wind lip. So I mention the name of the helicopter company to warn, because they gave us the most green, rookie helicopter pilot I have ever flown with. He would get scared to land in the light breeze and then do this massive, oversized circle to come around and try and land again. Sometimes he repeated this 8 times before landing. Usually if a pilot is not comfortable he will just say this landing won’t work and move into a different area. This guy would just wimp out then keep trying. Basically our heli time was doubled because of his inexperience in the mountains. Despite all that, we had an incredible day with deep pow and lots of cliff drops. My first run was probably the gnarliest with a big cliff at the bottom. The end of the day I had a good tumble high speed off a small cliff and my head punched through a crust layer that didn’t feel too good. Boothy was charging by the end of the day just sending stuff fat to flat and sticking it too. All and all we were both stoked and ended up getting some really good footage for RipCurl. So make sure to check out RipCurl.com soon to see all the goods.
Tuesday August 10th. Words by Chris Booth
New Zealand had a fairly ordinary July. The one or two snow falls didn’t deliver much to the South Island and the alpine conditions were more or less below average. Then as August kicked off, things deteriorated even further. This was the unfortunate reality for the World Heli Challenge competitors who, after seeing last year’s incredible conditions, were confronted with two days of consecutive rainfall at 2000m followed by a brutal freeze on the ever of the event, creating arguably the worst conditions of any big mountain contest, ever.
Ironically, of perhaps just painfully, a nice little system rolled through the alps the day after the event, dropping up to 50cm from Mt Cook Northwards. So, having had little opportunity to ski good terrain for a good month, I jumped at the idea of two days flying in the Aoraki/Mt Cook region to shoot for RipCurl’s winter 2011 catalogue. After a month long dry spell i was finally going to ski some real powder.
Rumours of instability in the snow pack were circulating throughout Hermitage hotel – the spectacular heritage-listed climbers lodge and home to heli enthusiasts, as our guide explained to us, with visible discomfort, how two members of the Burton team were swept away in a grade 3 avalanche the day we arrived (all were fine). In respect of that the call was made, we would take a snowplane up to the Tasman glacier for our first day, where we could stay safe in some low-angle glacier terrain and then follow that up with a day’s heli the next day.
At 27 kilometres in length, the Tasman Glacier is New Zealand’s longest glacier. It is as much as 4 kilometres wide and 600 metres deep, and lies entirely within the borders of Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park. The glacier covers an area of 101 square kilometres and starts at a height of 3000 metres above sea level. With that sort of altitude, the glacier had captured 60cm of cold, dry snow from the storm and to us, was waiting to be tracked.
Wednesday 11th August.
After a ripper of a day up at the Tasman Glacier playing in the ice fields, we were ready to get in the heli.
We were after some safe mini-golf lines to ski. Mini-golf lines are very productive on a photo shoot because it allows the athletes and camera guys to work closely together to get the shots they need. It also allows for multiple quick rotations on a single slope which is both time and cost effective. Unfortunately our pilot was inexperienced with flying in the mountains and was unable to drop us on the sort of terrain we wanted. He even struggled to land the bird on what appeared to be the most facile of landings, taking multiple approaches to finally put it down and resultantly, burning heli-time like it was going out of fashion.
There is a golden rule with big-mountain skiing: never tee off on a big line. These mountains are huge, and when you first get up there your sense of scope is bizarrely warped and more often than not, you find yourself greatly underestimating the size of things, like cliffs. Thanks to our pilot, we found ourselves atop the biggest line of the day for our first run. This didn’t phase Andy [Finch] though who, after saying a brief prayer, dropped into his line and committed to a very large cliff, around 60ft. The cliff was at the bottom of the line and by that point the snow was not soft and powder-blanketed as it was at the top but hard and crusty. Andy dropped it but bounced hard upon landing, injuring his ankle and slowing him down for the rest of the day. I stupidly followed him, because that’s what stupid Australians do, but hesitated above the bottom cliff, which had been completely sluffed-out by Andy having ridden it before me. I traversed out and around it, dignity in tatters but body in tact.
The rest of the day went smoother. We found a few more gentle slopes that had several lines to choose from. We sniffed out some nice powder and launched some workable cliffs to get our glossy photos. As the day progressed our confidence increased and our comfort in the mountains heightened. Ideally you would want to spend about 2 or three days in the heli to really find your feet, its a hostile and alien environment up there and it really takes time to ease into it. It comes as no surprise then, that by the last run of the day it felt like we were just getting started. That’s why they call it frothing.
Rip Curl makes mountainwear that works, that’s why they sent Andy and I out to the highest, most remote point of New Zealand to test out their 2011 Ultimate range. We love the new heater-integrated S-bomb down vest and the 4-way stretch jacket in its new, longer cut. Its nice to be part of a company that practices what it preaches, thanks to Rip Curl for keeping the dream alive.
Sno Box Jam in summer
Posted by finch | Filed under Uncategorized
Just got back from Woodward and having the time of my life. So much to do and the sno campers got to experience it all pretty much. Here is a video from one night at the rail jam on the snoasis feature at Woodward, PA.
Bak Yard Track
Posted by finch | Filed under Uncategorized
I have been wanting to get a track going for a few years now in the summer, but after a couple days of digging in the rocks I seem to find something else to do, but I finally dropped in and committed. I always have winter features, but snow is just a tad bit easier to move around. So here it is mostly all done and lots of fun. The track starts out with a rock ride, with a few banks, a log ride, a couple hips, a step up and a fun tree jib to pallet. If you know where I live, bring a bike by, play some shoes and run the track with me. We’ll cool down by floating the Truckee River afterwords.