Winter is a fickle thing. Sometimes it delivers and other times it doesn’t. In 2016 this is simply a fact, unfortunate as it may be. And as a professional snowboarder, this means I have to go where the snow is. Which as far as January and February were concerned, Whistler, BC was it. I had been spending a lot of time in the region filming for Absinthe Films' new, currently untitled movie, riding a lot of powder and seeing little sun. As the weather refused to cooperate, filmer Justin Hostynek and fellow Absinthe riders Manuel Diaz and Kimmy Fasani decided to take off to Haines, Alaska to meet up with Nicolas Müller and start their AK season with a five day window of blue bird days and a private heli.
The night before their departure Justin mentioned Nicolas was going to be a day late, leaving the heli one man short. “How would you feel about coming up for a day and filling the seat?” he asked. Immediately thoughts of AK spines and heli bumps overcame the feeling that this might get expensive, especially for a single day. But I looked at Justin and said I’m in. It’s not the craziest thing I’ve ever done, but it is pretty damn close.