Thursday night I headed up to Bellingham with Rime Knits Owner, Ross Reid. We woke up at 5 am Friday morning to beat the rush of cars to Mt. Baker’s opening day. 4 ft of fresh snow awaited us as we pulled into the dark empty lot. It was an incredible day of some of the deepest snow I’ve ever skied with some wild crazy FUN ASS people including Surface team riders Eliel Hindert, brothers Mattias and Micah Evangelista.  Our shred posse also included our guide for the day, Mr. Grant Gunderson. DubSatch boys Sam Cohen and Taylor Lymam also scrambled to get the goods all the way from utah! After a full day of neck deep pow turns, countless high fives, and continuous choking and laughing we met up at Bellingham’s Casa Que Pasa for well deserved burritos! From there I stuffed into a little car between beer, wine, wet ski gear, and stinky boots with friends of friends across the boarder to Vancover. From there we dropped off some people, picked up a truck and some other people and rallied up to Whistler!! With pretty skys, new friends, and fresh snow we shreded the rest of Whistlers opening weekend till our quads were on fire. Sunday evening I jumped into another friend of a friend… of a friend’s car where we made our way back across the boarder and to my car parked at Ross’s then finally back to my house.  THEN, some how woke up this morning for my dentist appointment, then to my physical appointment and THEN I’m waking up early tomorrow morning to drive to Utah where I’ll be posting up again this winter. woooooo

After a full year of winter, one huge season in Utah then straight to New Zealand, all I
longed for was some warmth. I found it in the desert of Southern Utah where I
spent 12 days sleeping out of a van. While exploring and camping in new areas
each night I spent my days watching sunsets, practicing yoga, reading and
running. The silence and vast beauty of the desert was divine and healing. It
was wonderful to be reunited with my dog Baker again. He cuddled every night
with me, I missed him soooo much! I went on some really cool hikes through the
slot canyons near Escalante. If you’ve never been there I highly recommend it!  I also spent one weekend in Moab mountain biking with my whole family. (It has been a whole year and a half since we’ve all been together!) There was an event called “Outer Bikes” where we got to try all the new 2012 bikes. It was awesome. Now I’m back in the great Pacific North West until the snow starts to fall. Until then my feet will dance with freedom from the constricted confines of my ski boots.

My head was still buzzing from the night before, my last night in New Zealand. Our car made its’ way though the bright green valley floor dotted with hundreds of sheep and sharp mountains jutting through the hills. I was on my way to catch my flight but decided to sneak a bungee jump in for kicks. I just couldn’t leave NZ without doing the classic tourist move. I sent all my NZ friends final goodbye texts, thanking them for loving me like a sister. It’s so strange to think I’ll probably never see most of them ever again. Here is a summary of my incredible trip. Incredibly amazing, incredibly difficult, incredibly beautiful… but yes, it was defiantly incredible.

Arriving in New Zealand (as I do) with next to no plans and a contact or two shoved in a pocket, I eventually settled into the stunning town of Wanaka. I moved into a little house, right on the edge of town, with 4 random girls from all over the world. We all became best friends instantly and with time became like sisters, sisters of “The Doll House.” Even in tight quarters and scary financial times, to this day, I love each of them. I shared a loft with 2 of the girls, lived off noodles and toast, used a $10 filing cabinet as a dresser, and slept in my puffy down coat, a beanie and sleeping bag to stay warm. Nothing to worry, us crazy dolls made the very best of it!

With a very late start to the season, due to an extreme lack of snow, a job was hard to come by. By the end of the season I some how managed to get fired from two, but finally landed a great job. I can say with confidence I went from the worst job of my life, to the best one. For most my trip I reckoned I’d never be able to afford a flight out of the country. At times I had over drew my bank accounts, had to borrow money and had past hospital bills digging my hole deeper then I knew was possible.

A 6 ft storm kicked off the season and Treble Cone was going off! Opening day was an epic pow day with the highest amp level I’ve ever experienced. Early in the season I did a fun competition called the Triple Comp, where I won $500 to a local ski shop!

Thanks to some wonderful souls I was able to raise the money to compete in The World Heli Challenge. I placed 2nd on free style day and toped the Big Mountain day off with one of the scariest crashes of my ski career, in the midst of it all loosing a ski to never be found. The search for my ski quickly came to an end when 2 time champion of the event, Mr. Ted Davenport, shattered both legs. (send your love his way!)

I also spent some time volunteering with a program ran through Snowdrifta, teaching pre-schoolers how to ski. It was refreshing being around such joyful, free spirits.

In September I was telling my flat mates how I was confident in my decision NOT to compete in the North Face Free Ski Open. There I was, a couple days later, competing in the event. I ended up only .23 points away from the podium but was happy as a clam about placing 4th.

I spent my last day shredding in the sunshine at Snow Park with my favorite people and partied my face off till all hours of the night. Along with a gnarly hangover on my 2 day mission home, came a stone cold $300 excess baggage fee. If I wanted to catch my flight I had a window of 10 minutes. After a flurry of frantic shuffling and tears, I had to throw away 2 pairs of poles, all my outerwear, jeans, some thermals, sweat shirts and t shirts. (luckily I had already lost the pair of skis I brought so I didn’t have to toss those into the rubbish as well)

The whirlwind of events finally settled as my plane touched down in SLC. While it’s all over in a blink of an eye, I still can’t digest everything that happened in the 4 months I lived in that beautiful, little town. It was such a crazy ride packed full of adventure, surprises, beautifully genuine people, lots of tears and even more laughs. With the bad came the good, and with the terrible came the wonderful and as always I’m thankful for every second of it!

It’s may 9th and I’m curled up in my sheets watching in rain galore on SLC. Apparently it’s snowing up canyon piling on the our record breaking snow pack. Looking back at my season I immediately picture a roller coaster of events. Humm, whats new? My season was packed to the brim with unexpected road trips and hang overs, bear hugs and bad jokes, tremendous heart breaks and pain, an array of different couches and floors, hating being single, loving being single, down days and days the sun couldn’t be brighter. There was much lost and more gained and as usual, I am overwhelmingly grateful for every second of it.

I suppose my season started in August in Chile where I placed 6th in the first stop of the Freeskiing World Tour. Fall rolled around in SLC and winter didn’t want to wait dropping some epic storms opening Alta with an awesome base. It was only the 2nd day Alta was open I broke vertebrae T 11 attempting a back flip, hence the “tremendous heart break.” I spent only about 3 weeks on the couch, decided I wasn’t hurt anymore and stubbornly skied groomers until the comp in Revelstoke arrived. Pushing the trip on my self, thinking there was no way I would miss it, was reckless but welcome to bloody-minded me. I ended up being mostly a spectator at the event and got frost bite on most my toes.

As I struggled to get my strength and confidence back I skied lightly around Little Cottonwood Canyon. I met my now very good friend Nat Segal who started to push me off cliffs again. We then took a fun trip to Kirkwood where the ups and downs only got bigger. We both qualified but fell in semi finals where our friend Ryan Hawks also crashed. A day after Ryan was air lifted to a hospital he died. We were all stunned. I didn’t want to believe it for a long time but eventually it hit home and I felt squashed with the harshness of reality.

Powder week in Jackson Hole was a good get away from frustrations where I skied some great snow with close friends and confirmed with my self life is beautiful and good. Then came the Bird comp, every one’s favorite, where I placed 9th. EH, I’ll take it. At least my back wasn’t sore any more and my confidence was lifted. There was just one more comp to my season…ALASKA.

I finally made it up to Alaska, my dream for many years. Although the competition (World Extreme Skiing Championships) never happened I made the best of it, met some funny locals, went ice climbing, slept in random RV’s and snow caves and best of all, went blue bird, Heli skiing in blower Alaskan Pow!

To wrap my season up I switched ski companies from Fat-ypus Skis to Surface Skis. I had a great go with Fat-ypus, I only have positive things to say about that company. As my first sponsor ever they believed in me and encouraged me through my ridiculous amount of injuries, created a women’s ski (named after me) called the V-rock, gave me full page ad’s in Freeskier, and made an awesome poster of me and my ski. But all things come to an end and I’m stoked as ever to work with the fast growing ski company Surface. I’m loving the skis and feel more playful then ever on them.

After enjoying the spring slush and pow at Snowbird I’ve booked a 1 way ticket half way across the world to Wanaka, New Zealand, where I plan to spend their winter skiing, working, partying, surfing, bungee jumping, and whatever else those crazy Kiwis talk me in to.  Then, who knows! I’ve always wanted to go deep water soloing in Thailand. Plans first, the rest will follow. Like they always do.

It’s every skiers dream to ski here, and if it’s not, it should be! My first out of three flights to Valdez took off early on march 24th. I was excited and anxious! I didn’t have many plans once I arrived but knew that this trip was ment to be and that it was going to work out. I had wanted to go here since I was 10 years old and my grandpa took me flying around Vashon Island in his little chopper. How cool would it be to take one of these things to the top of a mountain in Alaska? So I put it on my list of things to do 12 years ago. After finding my luggage I asked 3 strangers if any of them were heading to town.  John, who worked on the pipeline drove me into town and gave me a nice little tour…”don’t blink gurl, or you might miss it!” The town consisted of a harbor, a few hotels and 1 grocery store. I found Jacqui and John, friends from the freeskiing tour and crashed with them. Conditions were looking bleak. Some locals were saying it’s the worst they’ve seen in 30 years! I tried to stay optimistic while we killed time between card games, exploring the harbor and the liquor store.

There was an athlete meeting in town and we were told we were on at least a 5 day weather hold. It did finally start to snow and everyone’s moods lifted! We checked out Tailgate Alaska and met tons of awesome people. We found that a common down day hobby was to run road laps. You hitch hike to the top of Thompson’s  Pass, ski down a handful of faces and drops, ski to the road and do it again! A good crew of us had a blast jumping around the drops and features between the roads. One day, Dave Wade, a guide from a heli operation took a small crew of us ice climbing! I had always thought it looked like a cool thing to do but never thought I’d have the chance to try. It was so fun and not too difficult to figure it out! Besides that we hung out at tailgate, wandered up and down the strip of tents, snow caves, air streams and RV’s and drank beers in Ian Fohrman’s RV.

I had some really good times hanging out with the Alaskan locals. One night we went across the road where some locals had set up and awesome scene with a huge fire that had amphitheater seating around it and an over hanging tarp. A big Bob Marley tapestry hung over it all with a flood light shining on it, a snow cave above it next to a snow cave slide. They had a huge grill with tons of food, music blasting and best of all, they had their very own porta potty! After snacking on fresh halibut and partying the night away, a few friends I met camped out next to them, and passed out in our own snow cave.

My biggest goal of the trip was to go heli skiing! Conditions didn’t seem to be shaping up for it so I was starting to wonder if it was going to happen. One morning I got a ride with some Tahoe boys 15 miles to Alaska Rendezvous Heli where to our surprise was completely blue bird! This was it! I was going in the heli!!! I ended up getting put in the employees  shuttle who happened to be a bunch of rippers and an awesome guide. When we took of I had so many butterflies of excitement.  We flew directly next to a vertical wall and circled huge peaks, I felt like I was seeing mountains for the first time in my life! The pilot dropped us off on a knife edge ridge and we all held on to one another and he flew away. All of the sudden it was silent. The rocks and snow dropped away on both sides of me, and the peaks towered all around me and I thought, this is exactly what I imagined it’d be like. We skied a long steep couloir with sick pow all the way down that dropped into a huge valley of snow that we hoped around on! It was a dream come true, I’ll never forget that moment!

We tried to hold the competition but it just never happened. One day we waited on top of the venue for almost 3 hours in a white out storm. We decided we would just give it a go next season since so many of us had flights booked. The last night there was a memorial party for our fallen brothers Shane McConkey, Doug Coombs, and CR Johnson. There was an enormous fire, lots of whiskey and fire works and a never ending dance party in the Rendezvous bar. As I danced around all my new friends begged me to change my flight and stay longer. It was an amazing trip full of rowdy good times and many many Alaskan bear hugs!

For the first week of March Jackson Hole Mountain Resort brings us Powder Week! Powder Week is pretty much Powder Magazines Ski testing, but more importantly, one BIG party. There was definitely no way I was going to miss it, so my partner in crime Nat Segal and I rounded up some CD’s and rallied to Jackson for a quick 2 day visit. Good friend and photographer Julie Weinberger got a job as Jackson Hole’s marketing director so not only did she provide a place to stay and free lift tickets, but  introduced us to some super rad people and some secret stashes all over the resort! After some amazing shredding, tons of free beer, and countless hugs I figured,what a better way to celebrate the life of our brother Ryan Hawks?!

I headed to Kirkwood for the first time ever with Friends Daryn Edmonds and Nat Segal. I was really excited to check out the mountain and see some old friends. Qualifiers went well, considering the strong winds and flat light. I got 3rd place while my good friend Nat placed first! It was then time for us to inspect the our lines on the forbidden Cirque!

Thanks To Fatypus Skis for making me skis and a poster! (next years skis look SIIIICK!)

Utah transplants Collin Collins and Vanessa Aadland have meandered their way from Salt Lake up to interior British Columbia for the Canadian Freeskiing Championships at one of North America’s newest ski areas, Revelstoke Mountain Resort. Revelstoke boasts more vertical than any other resort in North America and is the only stop in Canada for 2011 Freeskiing World Tour.

Vanessa, originally from the Seattle area is no stranger to the big mountain comp scene, and hoping a recent injury to her back will not hinder her from flashing a smooth solid run for the judges.  Collin mostly know for his freestyle prowess and incorporating it into the natural terrain and BC kickers is hoping to take advantage of the new judging criteria which now takes “style” into consideration.  We are excited for both of them and wish them safe travels and good luck up in the Great White North.  We will keep you posted with any updates.

Unfortunately due to my back, I skied very mellow and didn’t qualify for the comp but it was a blast exploring Revelstoke and watching the comp. A couple of the days were amazing conditions with up to 11 new centimeters one morning. I also had some good times raging in the town, staying up way past my bed time.