For those of you who are regular readers of this blog, you’ll know that I love to snowboard and that I leave Ontario every winter in search of fresh lines. It is an annual tradition that has been going on for over a decade.

One of the things I wish I had been more diligent about is collecting all of the trail maps. I am sure I have a number of old ratty ones in some of my snowboard bags and snow pants, but none of them are probably worth keeping.

That’s why I think this is a terrific Kickstarter campaign by James Niehues. Over the last 30 years, James has researched, photographed, and painted almost every ski map in use across North America. Yes, these maps are all painted by hand. 

If you would like to back James’ project – a hardcover coffee table book of his work – you can do that here.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/orsc/james-niehues-the-man-behind-the-map/widget/video.html

I know it’s only August, but I am already thinking of snowboarding.

And I just recently learned that the British Columbia government has given the go ahead for a new multi-peak and year-round ski destination near Valemount, BC. The summits will include Mount Pierre Elliot Trudeau, Twilight Glacier, Glacier Ridge, and Mount Arthur Meighen.

Here is a photo of Mount Meighen (taken in September) from the project’s master plan.

Here is where Valemount is situated. It’s a 7 hour drive from Vancouver and a 5.5 hour drive from Edmonton.

Here is the mountain range in relation to Valemount. Right hand side of the image. Sorry, I know it’s small.

Here is the master plan that just got approved. Valemount is once again on the right / east.

And here is why this is a big deal (at least in my world):

- Valemount has the potential to be “the third largest lift-serviced non-contiguous vertical” in the world at 2,260m (7,415 feet). Zermatt, Switzerland and Chamonix, France are number 1 and 2. Of course, it would still get the title of the largest vertical drop in North America.

- There are a number of glaciers that would allow for summer / year-long snowboarding.

- They want to create a multi-valley snowboarding experience, similar to the European Alps.

- The mountain range has one of the highest average snowfalls in Canada. Valemount gets 5.36m (211 inches) per year and at an elevation of 1,800m it’s 14m (551 inches) of snowfall per year. This is more than Whistler. Because of this, they are not planning any snowmaking.

- There’s an airport nearby.

- One of their guiding principles is to minimize the environmental impact.

Construction is expected to begin in the spring of 2017 and the plan is to open to the public by December 2017. The first phase will include Twilight Glacier at an elevation of 2,530m (8,301 feet). So right from the outset, there will be summer skiing.

If you’re curious what the master plan for a ski resort looks like, you can download the entire report here. It’s only 324 pages.

My condo has an east exposure. That means I get direct sun in the morning and no direct sun in the afternoon, once the sun has crossed over onto the other side of my tower.

But a funny thing happens in the late afternoon and early evening. The sun reaches just the right angle and begins to reflect off the apartment across from me. That apartment is about 11m away.

Once this happens, it then feels like I’m getting direct sun again. It floods my apartment. This may seem like a small thing, but I love it when this happens. It’s happening right now as I write this post.

So I can only imagine what it must have felt like for the residents of Rjukan, Norway when they got their first taste of winter sun back in 2013.

Rjukan is a small town of approximately 3,400 residents. It’s located about 2.5 hours west of Oslo and is situated within a deep east-west valley. 

As a result of its geography, the town is cast in shadow for about half of the year, from September to March. The elevation of the sun is simply too low for direct light to reach down and into the valley.

So what the town did was install a set of solar powered mirrors on top of the mountains. The mirrors – also called heliostats – track the sun and reflect it down into the town’s main square. Now the town gets winter sun.

Interestingly enough, many residents opposed the mirrors before they were built. They viewed it as a frivolous expenditure. Petitions and Facebook pages were created. But now that the mirrors have been installed, most of the naysayers seem to have changed their tune.

I think it goes to show just how important light is, but also how difficult change, of many varietals, can be.

Image: Flickr