Andrew Strain Photography » BC

My New Haircut

Strain — Sun, 25 Jul 2010 05:08:13 +0000

You know what this is? This is my new f***ing haircut.

Bush life is good.

Coastal Summer

Strain — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 02:58:30 +0000

Continuing on last weeks theme – summer in the mountains of coastal BC.

Far over the Misty Mountains cold…

Strain — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 14:26:23 +0000

…To dungeons deep and caverns old,
We must away, ere break of day,
To seek our pale enchanted gold.

-JRR Tolkien

Camouflage…

Strain — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 16:03:39 +0000

…you’re doing it wrong.

Spring Touring – Cerise Creek

Strain — Fri, 07 May 2010 06:36:00 +0000

I went on a touring mission up Cerise Creek / Mt Joffre with a couple friends last week. Conditions were… interesting over the first half of the approach, where for the first time since I bought them I wasn’t cursing the uselessness of my snowshoes. The crampons bit into the choppy ice of the forest floor far more effectively than climbing skins, but I’m still buying a splitboard this fall. Snowshoes suck.

We thought the snow might be a little sloppy up high, but avoiding sun-baked aspects led to a late April powder harvest. Gotta love that spring crop!

Surface Tour – The End?

Strain — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 03:46:42 +0000

Our extra day in Whitewater used up most, if not all, of the energy I had left. Moving on to Red Mountain, which I’ve heard so many good things about, was something that my body was not ready to do. I took one lap to say I was there, then retreated to the demo tent to let my body recover from 3 weeks of constant travel and riding. The mountain was socked in anyways, so I didn’t feel too bad about not even bothering to shoot.

The plan was to demo at Red, then drive through the night back to Whistler and set up the final demo of the tour at TMC (where you can buy Surface Skis in Whistler) the next day… but the Kootenays struck again, wedging a rock into Eliel’s tire and keeping us in Ymir for an extra night.

We arrived in Whistler a day late, but the extra night in the koots let El and I make the windy drive back to the coast at a leisurely pace, and in daylight.

Note I say El and I. We left Shayne in Ymir, promising to return in a week or so to take him to Denver for SIA and then home to SLC. More on that later…

We returned to Whistler after 15 days on the road, and right on schedule the first major storm since we left rolled in. Low visibility, deep pow and alpine closures – to the trees! Exploring new hills was a blast but theres a lot to be said for knowing your favorite line like the back of your hand…

So thats that. Demo tour done… end of the line! But my adventures with Surface are far from over. A week later, I’d get back in the truck with Eliel and head back to Ymir, Whitewater and destinations south…

Dendrite Studios – Perspectives

Strain — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 05:54:30 +0000

Just a quick little plug for the boys at Dendrite Studios, a new film company out of Whistler currently working on their first full length video for release in fall 2010. Two of my good friends and favorite photo subjects, Jake Cohn and Eliel Hindert, have been filming with them all season and I can’t wait to see the finished product.

Eliel and Chris Turpin go big in the Pemberton backcountry:

Perspectives #6 – Ten Years from Dendrite Studios on Vimeo.

Jake Cohn and Athan Merrick getting creative with camera placement on and around Whistler:

Perspectives #4 – Point of View from Dendrite Studios on Vimeo.

Check the Dendrite site for more ‘Perspectives’ clips, a full length teaser (soon), athlete profiles and other goodness.

Surface Tour – Whitewater, Day 2

Strain — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 02:05:59 +0000

I’m willing to bet you have absolutely no idea where Ymir is. Neither did I, until I rolled into town in the Surface truck, looking for the house of a friend of a friend who had offered up their floor for us to crash on for a couple nights. Amazing how that works in the shred world; share a lift, ride, lap or beer and a complete stranger becomes a good friend.

Cruising back up to Whitewater from Ymir, it was pretty obvious that we made the right choice sticking around for an extra day: the storm had let up overnight, and by the time we got to the parking lot there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. For the first time, we were able to take in the incredible setting surrounding Ymir peak that makes Whitewater a no-brainer destination for anyone willing to get a little sweaty accessing a line: trees, pillows, bowls, chutes, spines, cliffs… the Whitewater slackcountry has it all and then some. I was giddy with excitement, both to shred and shoot – when was the last time you saw a photo from a bluebird day on my blog?

After spending the morning in the same zone as my all-time lap the previous day, Eliel and I rallied at the truck, kitted up with our touring gear, and headed off into the alpine in search of cliffs basking in the late afternoon light. Mission accomplished – although I know El wishes he found some stupid big triple stager to send off of. Watch him go for the glory in the Whistler backcountry in the Dendrite Studios video, dropping this fall.

We spent 2 days at Whitewater, but it only took one lap for me to be sold on this undeveloped powder gem. It isn’t for everyone – you can count the park features on one hand, and many of the good lines lie beyond the resort boundary. Don’t show up unprepared for backcountry travel.

For my friends: picture shredding with me on a whis pow day. Take away everything that sucks about where we’re riding, and you have Whitewater. Yeah, I figured you’d be stoked.

Where the Log Driver Learns to Step Lightly

Strain — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 02:09:37 +0000

Partying the night away in Fernie presented us with an interesting problem: Shayne and I had done some serious damage to our bar tab (and livers) and while driver Eliel stuck to water, we still had to be at Whitewater the next day to run another demo. We were still drunk when El managed to wake Shayne and I at 5am, setting us up for my favourite past time – being drunk in a car travelling through the dark, windy mountain roads of southern BC. Fortunately Eliel was still paranoid of black ice and had mercy on his half inebriated, half hungover passengers, taking it easy on the potentially treacherous road. His suspicions proved accurate when we tried to get gas in Cranbrook: a right off the highway turned into a straight slide. We powered through to daylight and filled up in Creston.

A quick check of the road report in Creston showed that the Kootenay Pass was closed for avalanche control (a promising sign for the conditions at Whitewater) so we made the snap decision to take the sneak attack route on the ferry across Kootenay Lake and through Nelson. El took advantage of the downtime to catch up on his sleep – I took advantage of Nelson to buy more PBR and hot dogs.

As soon as we rolled into the Whitewater parking lot, we could instantly tell we were going to like this hill. One day lodge, no accommodation, 2 double lifts, total whiteout conditions, the muffled THUD of avy bombs… right up my alley. My first thought was, this is just like Baker, but more low-key. Theres something magic about these small, relatively unknown powder enclaves. Everyone is there for the same reason – theres no park scene, no big egos, no multi million dollar slopeside condos – just straight up, no frills no bullshit pow shred.

If you’re in the business of demoing fat, rockered skis, a hill that gets 40 feet of snowfall a season is a damn good spot to set up shop. Even without our fancy Surface tent – theres no way we could set it up in the howling wind – we were down to just park skis in mere minutes, which meant it was time to spin a lap. Local guidance took us to a spot that I’m not likely to forget any time soon. Easily the best run I’ve had all season, it was a good 400m of sustained drop through a zone of perfectly spaced trees, with endless pillows, chest deep pow, and no tracks in sight. I quickly lost everyone and tragically had to shred the line in one straight shot without stopping for photos.

The line popped us out onto the access road, a couple kms away from the resort. Board off, thumb out… within minutes we had a ride back up in the box of a pickup – a ride of doom that was significantly more thrilling than the shred down. I’m not sure how we made it up alive (or without taking out other cars), but our ear-to-ear grins of satisfaction were a clear sign that the risk was worth it. We kept lapping through the day, rotating off one guy to keep tabs on the demos.

Eliel was so amped on Whitewater that he never wanted to leave – even going to extremes like sinking the truck into a ditch full of quicksand snow. Strike 2 – the Kootenays really wanted that truck to stick around. We didn’t really want to leave, either, so we set up camp in the metropolis of Ymir for the night and postponed our Red Mtn demo a day. Little did we know, Ymir was about to become our home away from home… more on that next post.

For those of you still scratching your head over my post title, peep this extraordinary piece of Canadiana. The log drivers waltz pleases girls completely…

Surface tour – Fernie

Strain — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 00:35:08 +0000

We limped into Fernie in the wee hours of the morning following our ditch detour on the crowsnest pass, and woke around noon to a light drizzle at the base – not exactly a warm welcome for our return to BC. But, the hill at Fernie has a Grouse Grind worth of vert and the view across the valley suggested that it was snowing up top, so Eliel, Rob and I saddled up and rode through the rain towards the snow line. Conditions were mostly mashed pow-tatoes, but a short boot pack to the top of Knot Chutes rewarded us with fresh tracks and fun lines above the mank.

After a couple laps of sloppy pow we relocated over to the rail park – no jumps at Fernie – where El and I spent more time oogling lines beyond the ropes , wishing the weather was better, than actually riding. Our second day was more of the same – shot a couple photos, but the light was blah and the pow was sloppy. There be lines in them thar hills, though… a return trip when the snow is better is definitely on my to-do list.

Joel threw together another edit, starring Rob Heule killing the rail park and yours truly killing a bag of hot dogs:

Quick Cut – Surface Demo Tour Does Fernie from Jah Raven Creation on Vimeo.

The ski scene in Fernie was stoked on the demo tour – Grand Central, a local bar, even threw us a mustache party, complete with a schwag giveaway for the hombre rockin’ the best ’stache. A pair of fancy, limited edition 10/11 Surface poles went to the gnarliest trucker ’stache I’ve ever laid eyes on. Mad props. Apologies if my details on the night are sparse – Grand Central also hooked us up with a bar tab. Big thanks to Paul for a fun (and hazy) night.