Westbound Boarder

I’ve always had big dreams to quit my professional job and become a lifty for a season… but sadly, I think I’m a bit past my prime   Nonetheless, I still think it would be a cool experience, so resort job calls always catch my eye.  Which brings me to the most recent one I came across… If you live in SoCal and have big dreams of working at a resort (and, might I add, skiing for FREE all season long) Bear Mountain and Snow Summit are hosting job fairs the next couple of weekends (they’ll be interviewing at these job fairs, so dress to impress!)  Full-time and part-time jobs are available for both indoor and outdoor positions, including ski and snowboard instructors, snowmakers, groomers, lift operators, lift attendants, food servers, dishwashers, cooks and ticket sales. Deets below!

Saturday, October 2, 2010
8 a.m. – 2 p.m.
Snow Summit
880 Summit Drive
Big Bear Lake, CA
www.snowsummit.com

Saturday, October 16, 2010
8 a.m. – 2 p.m.
Bear Mountain
43101 Goldmine Drive
Big Bear Lake, CA
www.bearmountain.com

I’m not going to pretend to love the rain (because I really don’t) but nonetheless, it has been raining in LA the pase couple of days.  But one great thing about rain in the city means snow at the local mountains!  Big Bear/Snow Summit saw more than 14 inches of new snow this week, so if you’re thinking of heading up to the mountain, now would be a good time to do it.  And if the below photo doesn’t entice you, I don’t know what will!

Photo courtesy of Big Bear Mountain Resorts

March is usually the snowiest month at California mountains?  I had no idea!  I thought for sure the season would be done by March 1.  (Thanks, Bear Blog, for that tid bit of info.)

Other news from SoCal…

• Bear Mountain’s Superpipe is currently under construction.
• Sick (and free) concert at Mt. High Friday the 27th – Shiny Toy Guns.
• The Active BroDown ShowDown, a slopestyle competition for amateur and pro riders, is coming up this Saturday at Bear Mountain.
• Later that night, the Hot Dawgz and Handrails Qualifier will take place also at Bear. The top two competitors will get an invitation to the Main Event in September.

After heading to Bear Mountain, CA for the first time in years, I thought a review of the resort was in order.  Let me preface this post by saying, good snow in SoCal is hard to come by.  With 85 degree weather in the dead of winter (yes, its true) SoCal is known for its beaches – NOT its mountains!  Well, you wouldn’t think so, anyway.

Last weekend when I competed in the Burton AM Series, I got the opportunity to ride at Bear Mountain Resort (part of Big Bear) and I just have to say, I was quite impressed!  It was a park rider’s heaven, and combined with the 50 degree, ride-in-your-T-shirt weather, a perfect day.

Big Bear contains two separate hills – Bear Mountain and Snow Summit – and with the price of one ticket you get to ride at both.  Typically, Bear Mountain is known as more of a “snowboarder’s resort,” while Snow Summit is the side for skiiers (though neither side discriminates!)  Bear Mountain is only open during the day, while you can ride Snow Summit at night, so combine the two and make one long day!

I only had the chance to hit up Bear Mountain, so I’ll talk about that resort in this post.  I had my hesitations about heading to Big Bear – It hadn’t snowed in days, and I had just ridden at Vail a few weeks prior (quite the difference).  But I have to say, I was pleasantly surprised.  Bear Mountain is about as close to LA as a mountain can get, and the resort definitely knows it’s assets.  See, at most mountains, you can usually find a terrain park or two, maybe even a halfpipe, but Bear Mountain (since, admittedly, it doesn’t have the best free terrain) is basically one huge park.  I love sunshine, and I love riding the park when the sun shines just enough to soften your landing, so Bear Mountain was like a dream for me.

The mountain has 12 lifts and several runs, however, you would probably be able to hit up every run in only half a day.  There isn’t a ton of variety, however, they have more jumps and jibs than I’ve ever seen on one single mountain, and even a half and susperpipe.  The one thing I didn’t really like about the mountain is that there wasn’t much order to placement of things – jumps and jibs were randomly sprinkled throughout the hill, parks aren’t marked off, and no one called drop.  At one point, it took my 6 times to actually get a solid run through the park I was riding because people kept cutting me off or stopping in front of the lip…  So frustrating!   I definitely saw more than one accident throughout the course of the day because people weren’t as careful here as they are at other mountains.  I’m sure if you go on a weekday, though, things wouldn’t be quite as bad.

As for cost… not bad at all, in the grand spectrum of what you get.  Lift tickets run $53 for a full day, $30 at night, and a hot dog was only about 3 bucks! (Take that, 12 dollar hot dog I bought at Vail!)  And don’t forget, you can ride free on your birthday!

Being a great, but relatively close, weekend getaway for most So-Californians, Big Bear has a great town with a ton of stuff to do.  I didn’t stay in the town so I won’t go into too much detail, but if you’re planning on riding a few days in a row I’d recommend you check it out.

Have you been to Big Bear?  Tell us what you thought!  And check out my pics below, from the drive up.  Great view!

For the past few weeks, I had been counting down the hours until Christmas, not because I got to see my lovely family who I hadn’t seen in five months, but so I could make a much-anticipated trip to Mt. Hood for some serious shredding! (Just kidding mom and dad, of course I was excited to see you too! )  Reports of massive amounts of snow in both Portland and on the slopes excited me even more.  Unfortunately, to my dismay, the fluffy powder snow turned to rain on Saturday and Sunday, ruining our plans for a fun-filled weekend on the slopes.  Bummer!  Despite not being able to go to the mountain over the weekend though, my brother and I were able to catch a few minutes on our boards Christmas day with the nearly 1.5 feet of snow Portland saw that week. (Pictures below!)

I don’t carry all bad news, though.  According to Drew Jackson from the Travel Oregon blog, one to two feet of powder is expected to hit Mt. Hood tomorrow. (Two days too late for me! But snow, nonetheless.)   

In SoCal mountain news, looks like another sunny week at both Mt. High and Big Bear mountains.  And today, Bear Mountain officially opened the first pipe in SoCal!  And what a better week to check it out than this?  Good news is you definitely won’t see rain this week, but will the fresh snow melt away?  Hopefully not!  I’ll have my fingers crossed for a good few days over the New Years holiday here in Southern California.