iRide
Zaskoda’s Snowboarding Journal

This video came from Jayne on DallasSnowboarder.com. She is the bikini clad girl snowboarding in the video itself. I cut a small video after almost every trip I go on - but this time she beat me to it. I might still roll one of my own sometime, but for now I’ll be sharing the one above. The only adventure she didn’t touch on was the fire in our room! Otherwise, it’s a good overview of our trip in general. Enjoy the video. If you just have to know more, Jayne also posted a trip report.

Today is our last day in Chile. It’s been fun. We waited until today to attempt an accent to the top of the volcano. About an hour and a half from the rim, we had to stop and ride down. The clouds just wouldn’t break and with snow setting in - the conditions were too dangerous. It was still an adventure. Maybe one day we’ll make it back to hike the volcano again.

One our way down, Jason got a great shot of Jeff popping off of a little snow cover barn. All in all, we got a some really neat photos and videos from the trip. The little digital recorder I brought along wasn’t so great. I’ll do a full review later, but the main problem was poor vibration reduction technology.

We’re off the check out the club on our last night here. More stories to come.

So far, the trip’s been a crazy adventure. We had troubles and tribulations with our travel, but we arrived here with all of our gear. Our first day of boarding found us on hard pack snow that was ice in the morning but softer in the afternoon. We rode off piste on terrain I’ve never experienced before. The resort is low tech. Watch out for chair lifts on your way down or you’ll run into one swinging low. The view from the volcano is a ‘top of the world’ type experience with mountains, lakes, and other volcanoes all around.

Our room caught fire at the end of our first day. The hotel moved us to a different condo and cleaned all our belongings from the smoke damage. During our down day yesterday, we made our way out to Termas Geometricas. In short, we found a mystical experience. The scene was complete with ice cold waterfalls and streams, steaming pools of scalding hot water, rock overhangs with thick moss and lush vegetation hanging down, pillows of snow on top of red huts, and the most elegantly constructed system of bridges, decks and buildings. We jumped from the hot tubs into the ice cold streams and found ourselves comfortable sitting in wet swim wear in the open air at zero degrees celsius.

Today is another down day. A big rain storm blew in with lots of wind. We’re hopeful that it’s snowing up on the volcano Vallarrica. Tomorrow is supposed to be clear and sunny so it could be a good day. Here’s hoping for a little powder.

Well, I think I have all of my gear packed up and ready to go. I always forget something and I’m not sure really what to expect. I started off thinking I would fill a suit case, but I squeezed enough into the board back to get the rest into my pack. I think it will be easier to move around airports with my pack on rather than dragging a suit case in addition to the board bag.

I took back the camera I bought for the trip and will hopefully pick up some other alternative before tomorrow. I have no idea where to park my truck for the Denver airport. Oh, this will be fun. I’m sure it will all come together - it always has in the past.

Leave Denver tomorrow at 5, land in Dallas. Leave Dallas around 9, land in Santiago Saturday morning. Leave Santiago at 9:45 on a puddle jumper to Temuco. Grab a rental SUV and drive out to Pucon. From there, hope that Jayne knows where the condo is!

I think I should pick up and extra Gameboy DS game before I go.

Oh yes, and for the record, that sticker on my bag came out of an old Keoki CD I found while I was unpacking.

I was catching up over on DallasSnowboarders.com and ran across the following email reposted:

CASA Prez David Johnson and Tony Sponar of Valle El Arpa Greetings, skiers and snowboarders of the summer season!

Those of us in enjoying the South American winter want to make sure you know what you’re missing; record-breaking cold temperatures have helped a deep snowpack form right to the bottom of all ski areas across the continent, and well below in a lot of destinations.

With roadways closed to Farellones and Portillo this past weekend due to heavy snowfall, the staff of CASA Tours decided to check out the conditions at Valle Arpa, located 2 hours north of Santiago, South America’s only exclusively snowcat accessed ski area. The windy, 4×4-only access road had been cleared by staff in the morning, by Bobcat and shovels. The empty (as usual) parking lot had about 4″ of fresh, light snow, and the skies were bright blue.

We booted up in Toni’s warming hut, and bumped into the legend himself on his way back from warming up the cat. After a quick exchange on how our northern hemisphere winters had been, he decided not to wait for the other group that was supposed to have arrived for the first run of the day. Perfect… The 5 of us jumped on and we had the whole place to ourselves. The moonscape terrain of Valle Arpa was covered with a rippled layer of knee deep, low density Chilean champagne powder. I’d never seen the conditions so good here, during my 5 or 6 visits in the last 5 years.

Toni has big plans for his 2200 ha’s of terrain, which he’s owned since 1972, hoping to install lifts soon. But for now, it’s a paradise of uncrowded alpine bowls, with as much as 3500 ft. vertical per run, and more if you want to do some hiking.

This is definitely the best snow season I’ve seen since my first winter in Chile in ‘99. We’ve got limited space on trips in August, but plenty of room on our September tours. Come on down and beat the heat!

Contact us at 1 888 311 2272 or email us at casa@casatours.com to book your trip today! Be sure to ask us about last second deals going on now.

Mike Taylor

Big Powder in Chile

Summer Face Shots

Vertical Dry Pow

Sounds pretty exciting! I still can’t believe that this time next week I’ll be in Chile.

Yesterday, I booked my airfare to Pucon, Chile for August. This will be my first trip (any kind of trip) off of the North American continent. There are four of us going, all from DallasSnowboarders.com. None of us speak particularly good Spanish. We’re going to be very out of our element. Even with our tid-bits of broken spanish, Spanish in Chile is a lot different from the Mexican Spanish we’re used to in Texas.

The mountain seems interesting. In fact, it happens to be a volcano named Villarrica. It’s all alpine, there are no trees. There are supposed to be a lot of interesting natural features, such as half pipes, along with killer lake views. I’ll be sure and get a few photos and videos.