Going home...

Marcus, Pedro and Sal
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

Time to head off home now. Have to say goodbye to everybody including the cute little doggies!

Hiking Amongs Waterfalls

Hiking Amongs Waterfalls
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

After the presents were all unwrapped (and we had a late morning nap) we went to walk amongst the waterfalls at rooster rock state park. It was pleasant although the all too familiar portland cloudy/rainy weather was present too.

Presents!

Presents!
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

Its Christmas and we get to unwrap presents!

This year at the Hall household, everybody was allowed to sleep in. Sleeping in means sleeping till 6am of course, what you thought it would be noon? no no no. Apparently 4am is the usual time.

Christmas Eve Dinner

Christmas Eve Dinner
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

Twas the night before christmas and everybody was over for some prime rib! There was lots to eat and LOTS of presents underneath the tree. Now i know why the christmas tree had to be so big.

Beef
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

Not only did Melanie make a delicious prime rib, but there was also ham, mashed potatoes, pop overs (which are kind of like yorkshire pudding) and also Marilyn's famous deviled eggs.

Malaysia Night

Here we are at Marcus's place eating beef rendang, chicken curry, nasi lemak and chunnie's world-famous bah kut teh. We ate off banana leaves with our hands and all. Also note Marcus's HUGE christmas tree in the living room.

Vancouver -> Portland

We picked up the rental car from the airport in Vancouver and head off to drive to Portland. The drive wasn't too fun since it was raining most of the way and we were actually caught in heavy traffic at the border as well as around Seattle. A nice point in the trip was a stop at Redmond, Washington (the headquarters of Microsoft). There we met the ex-encentuate employee Brandon who should us his sexy new office and took us to eat some pretty darned good sichuan hot pot. We spent a while in Redmond and didn't start the drive to Portland until 6pm which meant that it was dark the entire way there. That also meant that JD was lumped (sleeping) in the back the entire way as well, life was restored to his body only when we pulled into the driveway at marcus's BIG house!

Whistler -> Vancouver

As we were leaving Whistler, it was raining and seeing as it was cold, the rain froze when it hit the pavement 'freezing rain'. It was really trecherous as we made our way from our apartment to the bus that was to take us to Vancouver. We were slipping and sliding all over the place and to make matters worse we missed the bus stop so we had to walk even farther than we planned and as usual we were late.

While in Vancouver we shopped. *yawn*

Bye Whistler

We're leaving whistler for Vancouver now... and boy am i glad we aren't skiing today. Its RAINING!!!

A Pain in my Ass!

The Whistler Gondola by Night
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

Today was our last day skiing, and of course TODAY was the first day it decided to snow. There was some pretty nice snow falling though not enough to totally cover all the ice on the slopes. We ventured into the terrain park today to do a few jumps and a superpipe as well!

Happy in a Gondola
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

On the final run of the day/trip/year i was skiing along and for some reason fell over (i would like to claim it was due to ice). I lost one ski and fell right onto the binding, then i lost the other and slid like 50 metres down the slope. Falling on the binding gave me a nasty bump and bruise on my bum. *ouch*

WhistlerBlackcomb
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

Other events of the day include breaking my skis... i kind of cracked the bottom when i was trying to get them to stand up in the snow, i was thanking my lucky stars that i agreed to buy the $4 damage insurance. But in the end the guy that i returned the skis to didn't even notice it.

Skiing Blackcomb

Bright sun
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

Another fun day of skiing. Spent the day on blackcomb and its been 4 days in the making but I finally fell down. :-o It was a really icy patch and I lost my edge.

Snowman
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

The one good thing is that my fall wasn't' as long as Sarah's. When i say long, I mean LONG. She fell at the top of an icy slope and slid all the way down. The hill was more than 100 metres long and she slid down on her butt the whole way. Even when reaching the flat bottom she just kept sliding, at least she was able to turn to the right (avoiding the cliff) and gently come to a stop.

Girls in a tub

Girls in a tub
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

After a long tiring day of skiing, what else can be better than a soothing soak in a hot tub? A soothing soak in a hot tub with bikini girls of course! *party*

XR vs a T-bar

XR on a T-bar
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

Today was a better day of skiing, for some reason despite there being just as little snow, the conditions seemed better.

Late in the day we went to one side of the mountain that had a type of ski lift called a T-bar. Its basically a T-shaped bar on the end of a string. Xuanrong (XR) was apprehensive about getting on the lift since normally the lifts we take are chairlifts. Getting on the lift went without a hitch, but later things took a turn for a worse after he yelled to me, "This is fun!". XR keeled over and was being dragged along the snow. He floundered around for some time until he finally managed to sit on the snow being pulled up the rest of the way.

In the words of another witness to his struggle, "that's some dedication."

1st day skiing complete

In a gondola
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

The first day of skiing is complete! The sun was shining and the skies were blue, it wasn't too cold and there wasn't too much snow. What I mean to say is that conditions were perfect except for the fact that the slopes were a little bit icy due to lack of snow, however the portions with snow-makers actually were a little better.

XR and Ian
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

In the morning, we dropped Chunnie off for her ski lesson at the bottom of Whistler mountain and not the other mountain in the resort Blackcomb where we are staying. I found out that her ski class would have lunch at the top of Whistler at about 12, so I said we would try to meet her there. Then off us boys went, up gondola for a morning of skiing. We went up and down and about 12 went up to the top to sit in the restaurant and have lunch. We were looking around for chunnie but in the mean time managed to bump into Liping. We said that we were looking for Chunnie as well, but Liping was kind enough to inform us that to our surprise we were actually on Blackcomb. D'oh! Later we realized we got on a gondola from Whistler mountain that was called 'Blackcomb Gondola'. This is what you call total incompetence.

Skis
Originally uploaded by ianhall.

Sarah arrived today! So you thought she was travelling with us? Nah, turns out she was wrong and she needed a visa to travel to the US, all because she has an old passport without some special page which a computer can read. After a delay of 1 day and a new flight that goes directly to Vancouver, she is here with us. :-)

And so it begins

Here i am at the airport, first one here (as usual). Though to be fair i only checked on Chunnie, she just left the house and i am assuming JD and Sarah haven't arrived before me. Perhaps this is an indication of the order that we will be descending the slopes at whistler? ;-)

So our flight route is long and irritating, from Singapore we go to Tokyo where we have to change planes. Then on to Portland, OR where we have a SIX hour wait before our connecting flight to Vancouver, which incidentally is the time it would take to drive there. And even when we reach there we still have a 2 hour bus ride to Whistler. I suppose if i want to enjoy skiing, there's no pain no gain, huh?

T-minus 4 days to departure

We've been planning our trip to Whistler for some time now (ie. months) and one would think that everything is in order and all we have to do now is pack and hop on the plane. Well... i guess not. I got an SMS from JD today, "Do we need a VISA for the US or CA?"

:-o!!

I'm sure i don't and i doubt if the americans STILL hate the british enough to make them get visas more than 200 years after independence. The canadians are on the other hand are just probably weird enough to demand it, eh?

So i told JD i wasn't sure, but i still haven't gotten a reply from him. Is that a good sign or a bad sign? hmmmm time will tell.