NEW ZEALAND :D

Wanaka :)

I flew Zurich - London - Singapore - Sydney - Christchurch, was meant to fly on to Wanaka but the flight was late with it being around 5pm it was cancelled as it was getting dark and Wanaka airport does not have lights on the runway, so 4 of us decided to fly to Dunedin and then get a bus. We arrived at Dunedin airport and were met by heavy low fog, we were seriously so damn close to landing liking almost touching the runway when the pilot pulled the plane up due to not being able to see and flew back to Christchurch :( The 4 of us who didn't know each other before were booked into a hotel for the night by the ladies of the airline and were booked on the flight to Queenstown the next day where we would then get a taxi to Wanaka!! The guys were worried about me as after 3 days of traveling I was like a zombie, swaying about when standing up so they looked out for me which was real nice of them. One was a teacher from Wanaka the other a helicopter pilot from Wanaka and the 3rd was from Australia, he had his big metal case that carried his hunting rifle as he was heading to the west coast to go hunting. The next day flying into Queenstown through the stunning scenery through the valley we finally touched down :)

House with red car in drive is where I stayed first week

We were driven to Wanaka airport where a guy Jack who I had got in contact with through another contact was letting me crash at his place until I found a place to stay which was very kind of him and am very greatful for that as it made things a lot easier. He had too cool housemate, Tom and Sarah and stayed with them for a week, I'd found a place within a few days of searching so wasn't too bad!! and I really couldn't have found a better place to stay/ have asked for better housemates was stoked just a rad crew to live with for the season and I'm missing them very much since leaving NZ!! One of the guys James had the most awesome cat you will meet called Smokey and another housemate Sarah had a beautiful dog called Rascal they would have rumbles round the house, so funny, here's photo's of them :)....

It was a later start to the season this year so to keep me occupied I would wonder around taking photo's just taking in the awesome surroundings almost not believing I was actually there in NZ. I remember chatting to my friend Ben the last 2 years when he's been over there for the season and dreamt of being there from all the rad stuff he was telling me and then to actually be there, crazy :D

As a lil interlude between Zurich and NZ....

here's an edit from a couple of years ago all filmed in an hour and a half kindly filmed by Nicol Paton, with some other footage added at the end....

Leaving Tux....

So now it was time to leave Hintertux :( buuuut I would be heading to NZ for the season :) I chilled out with Mark and Sam and as their transfer wasn't till later in the afternoon and my bus I needed to get to Mayerhoffen didn't leave until around 2pm. I got the bus from Tux to Mayerhoffen where I then caught the train to Zurich, I had to change train a few times which is a bit of a pest when you got a board bag and another bag but you get used to throwing them on and off and you'll get people who will help you!! Sure is an experience but also a wonderful way to see more of the country traveling by train.


I had got dates muddled up so I actually had almost 3 days before my flight to NZ which left from Zurich airport soooo I spent 2 days in Zurich, it was awesome a cool place indeed and was super warm that time of year :) The first day I was there was real warm and sunny and I spent the whole day out wondering around getting a bit lost then stumbling upon something cool then unlosing myself, haha!! The second day it rained most of the day but still went and wondered around Zurich, then one more night and time to leave catching the train to the airport, getting there early so chilling in the airport until time to go ready for what became 4 days traveling before I ended up in Wanaka, New Zealand....


Here's some photo's of Zurich....

BASI Level 2 Freestyle Coaching....

I was looking forward to this course but also really did not have a clue what to expect.... There were 20 of us doing it with Lesley McKenna and Hamish McKnight taking the course. I was the only girl doing the course but I love riding with the guys as thats what I'm used to and who inspire me the most, it was a fun and enjoyable course as well as being challenging!! For the level 2 you are on the mountain all day in the park hiking the jumps or box we were using and half pipe too. We would be up early as the park would get soft quick due to the hot bluebird days that time of year then we would have our tutorials around 7pm which was looking at and discussing footage from the day while getting lectures on bio mechanics in how our bodies move and as a coach what you need to look out for and how you are going to set up a coaching session that will help the individual!! It is more suited toward the higher end of coaching individuals who already have a good grasp of freestyle riding and are on the way to doing bigger better stuff rather than coaching those who are just starting out but the principles are really the same as sometimes to learn these things you need to bring it back to the basics.

Everyone doing the course were all dudes known throughout the british snowboard scene, all amazing freestyle riders and was a pleasure to meet and ride with them. A guy Mark King who I did my level 2 instructor with was back out for it along with some other guys he rides with at Hemel, Chris Mahony was doing it and the other 3 guys that I had been training with on the lead up to the course, I was not in their group but was stoked to be riding with knew people and both groups were pretty much doing the same thing on the mountain anyway. Sam Turnbull was also there doing his level 1 and 2 freestyle, awesome to ride with him and hang out. How the days worked were we would session the jump doing the criteria required to pass the course and if people were getting it then they could move on to doing whatever they wanted with Hamish giving them the push to do it and lil tips. 2 people in the group would work as a team in taking the session and giving feedback to the others as this happened though Hamish would come speak to you every so often on an individual basis to speak about what you'd just done and how you can improve it as you yourself at this level have an idea of what you are doing wrong too. Then the same would work for the box session. Hamish would be filming a lot of the time and this is what we would watch at the end of the day seeing what we needed to fix. Lesley also gave me some useful tips one in particular being think of a clock face when doing spins and rotate your hips further round that clockface to a certain time depending on what spin you are going for and it really does work!!

One of my favourite sessions was one day where we were riding the half pipe and doing backflips out of the bottom of it, this was not part of the course requirements but still good fun. On our last day it was total white out and the snow had been dumping so pow day, cruising around in our groups shredding the pow, front flipping, flat land tricking and chilling waiting to see if it would clear at all but no :( In the afternoon it was decided we would head to the park and we sessioned a side on down box, it was good fun and in a powdery park :) I was going for frontsides that turned into back 1's on, I was going in with speed and landing halfway down the box going big whereas a lot of the guys would get on and slip off half way and what I will take as a big complement coming from Hamish when he saw me hitting the box was that I was one of the gutsiest riders he's met and he's coached some of the best riders around.


Unfortunately I did not pass, I passed the coaching part but not the riding part, I'd done all the tricks but as I'm still in the transition phase from dryslope to snow I need more consistency and snow time to get there, I was gutted and sad as had worked super hard but also agree with that and it's only making me more determined and motivated to get better at riding on snow and getting used to snow jumps and hitting bigger ones :)


A massive thank you to Hamish for the training throughout the course and to all those who I rode with on it too, they were real supportive and learnt a lot from them, hopefully we will all get to ride again someday :)

Fun Times...

So fellow Bline team rider Chirs Mahony arrived out in Tux for his BASI Level 3 teach which started the week after my level 2 finished!! He joined the guys who'd been out doing their 2 week technical and were staying the extra week to do the teach as well. They were all stoked because Jenny Jones was joining them for this as I shredded around I saw her, always weird seeing pro riders for real as there just normal people!! Congrats to Chris as he passed. Of course everyone who'd been doing courses that week went out to celebrate, now the week before the marmot that sat in the reception area of the hotel got stolen so we were awaiting to see what would happen to the new one that had appeared. As I walked along the corridor the following morning I saw it outside someone's door with a scattering of mints beside it, it was a sinister looking thing that would give anyone a fright on opening the door, here's a photo, haha....

Went for a shred with Chris, Jon Merrifield and Chris Hazeldine doing some filming just having a bit of fun. Chris and Jon even took their highbacks off, quote of the day from Jon being.... 'I feel like a feminist taking off their bra and burning it' while throwing his highback on the ground, ahahaha!! Here's the long and the shortened versions of the Bline team and friends edit I made so yuo can choose which you'd rather watch!!....

Freestyle Training....

So I was doing the BASI Level 2 Freestyle Coaching course about a week and a half after completing the level 2 instructor, which meant I had time to get much practice in in the park :) I met a few of the dudes who were going to be doing the course too so we met up each day in the park and hiked the jumps and the box that we would be assessed on, we sure got a good work out especially because it was super warm and sunny pretty much all the time with the odd day being the exception. Started to get more comfortable hitting the jumps and especially hitting them switch as for the level 2 we have to show that we can spin in every direction and be consistent with our performance of the tricks.

We did some filming to analyze what we might be doing wrong and from this footage I made this lil edit of the funny bits from box training, hahahaha....

TUX KAPOW WOW WOW....

Throughout my month in Tux we got some crazy weather, it really does change so quick!! It was bluebird everyday, warm and sunny buuuuut on a good few occasions we would have total white out days where when your up the glacier you cannot see a thing, luckily this didn't really happen during my level 2 instructor but afterwards!! So my fresh snow and pow it was awesome but even more so if you could see it, haha!! There was also one morning where I woke up to the sight of snow out of my window where it had been bright green and spring/ summery and warm, crazy, although it did melt as fast as it fell.

Knee deep snow

Here's a wee pow edit I put together from one of the days....

BASI Level 2 Instructor....

I arrived in Tux a few days before the course started as wanted to get my bearings and have a shred of the glacier. On the Monday morning we met our trainer who was Rob Sanderson and the rest of the crew who were doing the course, there were 2 level 2 courses being ran as well as level 3 and all levels for skiing and telemarking, with adaptive courses running too, you name it that course was being ran, busy time out in Tux for BASI. Being out there surrounded by all these people I learnt a lot, especially about the snowsports industry and hearing about everyones travels and where they have done seasons and where they were off to next, inspiring stuff.

In the group I was in we had a rad group of 10 of us, we all got along real well and helped each other out while encourage each other too. We had a mix range of abilities with some struggling at some things and others at other things (yeah I know that doesn't make sense, haha), for me it was steeps, I had to work hard on this over the 2 weeks as well as everything else but for steeps it came down to the last day to keep them consistent and prove I could do them right so once I'd done it a good few times on the last day and Rob said to go try it switch it was a weight of relief. Neil McNair really helped me out throughout a couple of the days with getting the technique right by giving me little drills to do which helped a lot.


We had a day about of technical and teaching over the 2 weeks, he was happy with the lessons that I gave, my first being me choosing to teach a group of 9 year old boys or something how to do c-turns and damn they did a good job of getting in character, haha and to  make matters worse this was all while the level 3 guys were sitting at the side doing there stuff but listening in as well!! 2nd lesson I did was teaching backside 180's and also doing them switch, final one being a variables lesson and the next day I had Ben and Bish who were taking the level 3 saying they'd heard about it, haha!! So first week was good learnt so much and knew what I needed to work on. I'd arranged to meet up with the others on the Saturday to ride with them and work on everything, we all ended up in lil groups and I spent the day riding with Mark and whoever we came across, was good fun and helping each other out!! The next day we felt we needed a break from the 'BASI Robot', haha and headed to the park, where I rode with Paulo, Mark, James and JJ, fun day but we were caught by Rob shredding the park, oops, haha!! Here's a wee edit Mark put together....

It was an intense 2 weeks of training being out on the mountain between 8- 8:30 until around 15:30/ 16:00 then the lecture/ theory part for an hour or 2 after then working on lessing plans after all that too and reading up on stuff but your just in this lil bubble there where everyone is under the same pressure so you get it done and get through it and it helped having everyone to speak to at the end of the day and hear their thoughts on things. Would sit at dinner with those I was doing the course with and also a bunch of the level 3 guys so was interesting to hear what they were doing and you think we were stressed out they were even more so!!


The final day came and I went into it with the mentality of just having fun and enjoying it as that is when I ride my best and it seemed to work as I past which I was stoked on :D The afternoon came and we just wanted to ride the slushy bumps, haha man their fun, I think Rob thought we'd all gone mad which we probably had but was such a fun afternoon of riding all throughout this though he was style keeping an eye out that we were not falling back into any bad habits or anything!!


So I think that's enough written about this, just a big thank you to all the BASI trainers who helped me out and to all that were on the course as it was a pleasure riding with them and so much fun I hope we will get to ride again someday :)

Tux Tux Hintertux....

So first stop on my travels was Hintertux, Austria, where I spent the whole month of Month of May. I travelled Aberdeen - London - Zurich, then got the train from Zurich Airport to Mayerhoffen where I would then get a taxi up to Tux.

I started my travels at 5am and arrived in Tux around 11pm, haha!! When I arrived in Zurich I had already pre-booked the train tickets buuuut I thought the times were from leaving from the airport station not the main one, oops!! Luckily after speaking to the people I was able to use my ticket and still travel that day but only able to get to Jenbach and where I then caught a bus to Mayerhoffen much to the locals amusement seeing me with my board bag, etc who kindly helped me stow them away on the bus!! While waiting for the bus there were a bunch of young guys hanging around racing around in their cars. Although they did have pretty cool cars, I'll give them that!! It was around an hour on the bus and I was the only one left on the bus on reaching Mayerhoffen where I was greeted by many a taxi which then took me on a speedy ride up to Tux where I would live and shred for the next month. Although it would be a hardcore month of BASI Courses, doing my Level 2 Instructor and Level 2 Freestyle coaching....

Here's an edit of my journey to Hintertux....

Been a while....

Well I've been away the last 5 months living the dream of getting to snowboard everyday!! It has been the best time of my life so far, scary going away by myself but met so many amazing people and new friends so happy but sad to not be surrounded by them now I'm home. Although it has been good seeing friends and family back in Scotland too :)

I've not updated this while away so will bombard the blog with posts, haha!!