Archive for September, 2009
Loving life in Termas de Chillan. Surrounded by a magnificent sunset and volcanic prehistoric liquid hot magma.
Jen Hudak getting some La Parva pow.
Jen absorbing auras.
Jen thumbing. One of our many mornings of hitchhiking to the mountain.
Zipline. My first time. They just call it Canopy down there.
Hanging in the fog, shooting for Discrete’s new Catalog.
CIAO
I drove up Little Cottonwood canyon this morning to see if it was winter up there yet..
Almost, only a couple more months til all of this is blanketed with 12 feet of snow.
All packed up and ready to fly.
Flying. Arriving in Santiago, getting the first glimpse of the Andes mountains rising from the ocean.
Our first of many unbelievable sunsets in La Parva.
Almost every night looked something like this.
Hitchhiking to the mountain.
Passed this fine automobile, the chilean Brat.
Mountains are pretty big around here.
Poking/hiking around some more.
Nice stuff.
It was easy to find yourself in the middle of nowhere, Andes.
We did find the newly named run McConkey’s at La Parva. RIP Shane.
Down to enjoy a meal and another sunset after skiing.
The meals were so simple, and delicious down there.
Look how cool the sunset looks through Smith Nolte shades.
Yeah, that’ll work.
We did get out for a drink, I took a shot of this flag behind one of the bars.
We packed up our things, well tied our skies to the roof, and took off for Termas De Chillan.
This resort is 7 hours south of La Parva. The closest city is Chillan, pretty small city. Drive an hour out of Chillan and you find yourself at Termas de Chillan. When we arrive for our first day of skiing, look who we see on the billboard as you enter the resort. Hilarious, Lynsey Dyer, I emailed her this shot, I wonder if she know about it. The sign is huge.
Read the bottom of the sign.
Wow.
Jen likes it.
Holy crap.
Colors are amazing.
It’s good.
After a few minutes of everyone not talking, we were just laughing here at how amazing the sunset just was.
Dessert tasted good tonight.
Termas translates/means Hot Spring.
Another morning on the mountain, look at how tidy that presentation is. USA resorts please take note.
Take note of the surroundings.
Skis liked the view as well.
The area was surrounded by gigantic Volcanoes. Here is Volcano Nevado.
More sunsets.
More stoke.
Look at those peaks/volcano in the distance.
My shadow be enjoying it mucho.
On September 18, Chile’s Independence day, we celebrated by hiking to a cool volcano and skiing it.
Cool shot of the rim we hiked.
Everything is so much bigger than it looks up here. The flats to get to the climb were wayyy further than we anticipated. The climbs to get to this point were way steeper than expected as well.
On top and happy about it.
Our new friend Jeff enjoying the peak as well. All those mountains behind him are in Argentina. We had an incredible view up here.
The sunset on Independence night was amazing. Feliz diez y ocho.
It was time to skip town and try out some of the local cuisine.
Photographer Adam Barker enjoying his first Completo.
Waiting for the bus to get us back to Santiago, where Chopo Diaz was picking us up to get back to La Parva.
And we’re off.
Nice and situated. Got my Skullcandy headphones, a book, and Jen to cuddle up with.
You’re kidding me, even the sunset in the bus was insane.
My ski sponsor Atomic, had all kinds of love from La Parva mountain, here is just one of the billboards/photos/logos of Atomic all over the mountain.
We had a few more great ski days in La Parva, here is our last sunset.
Soaking/basking.
Our last day in town was cold and foggy. We took a walk and had a nice lunch.
Goofing around. Discrete hat fitting nice.
A neighborhood dog saying hello. Hello.
My Spyder bags are packed and ready to get home.
Even our shuttle to take us to Santiago then the airport was Atomic!
Grabbing a great lunch in Santiago.
One last view of Santiago before hopping on the plane.
Jen is a seasoned traveler.
Thanks for reading!!
We are leaving Termas de Chillan today. Yesterday was Chile’s independence day. We celebrated by hiking to the peak of Volcano Nevado, it is a volcano that climbs approx 3,000 feet above the surrounding mountains/volcanoes, pretty amazing view up there. I don’t have any photos of the volcano yet, but soon. We are leaving in a couple of hours to the city of Chillan, then hopping on a train to Santiago, then a subway to the outskirts of town, then Chopo is picking us up to head back up to Farellones. Termas is a very beautiful place, forests, parrots, huge spiders, volcanoes, incredible terrain, friendly people and lots to do besides ski - we’ve ziplined in the forest, got in the hot springs, and there is a casino, and lots of great places to eat.
We are posted up in Termas de Chillan til friday. Our trip started out in La Parva for a few days, then we made the 6 hour drive south to Chillan. The crew is photographer Adam Barker, Jen Hudak, newly crowned South American Freeskiing Champion Chopo Diaz, his legendary dad Claudio, and little ripper chilean Nico (he is 13 years old). We have a little 4 bedroom cottage a couple miles from the resort. Good company for sure.
Above is a shot of me from the sunset tonight. It was one of the best sunsets in the history of the world.
Here is a shot of Jen chilling in Chillan.
Desajunar.
More soon……CIAO
Check out the show, get some free gear from all these sponsors!!
Friday Sept. 11
I just got back home from an amazing trip to Southern Utah.
This is a photo of the road that we dropped into to begin our trip. Over the next 3 days we mountain biked 100 miles, camped, soaked up the never ending sights. I’ll post a blog about it soon.
