I was invited to participate in the World Ski and Snowboard Festival’s Icon Gone event this year. Icon Gone is a debate-based event where invited speakers (mostly Whistler-based writers and media personalities) make a 5-minute case for an iconic piece of Whistler they believe is integral to the town’s make-up. Here is my presentation, which guaranteed me 2nd place behind Andrew Mitchell and his topic of choice, bikes. To imagine it properly, envision me on stage wearing full raingear, sweating profusely and breathing heavy into the microphone while my legs and arms shake and I go into mild coronary failure. It was fun. – Mike Berard
What separates Whistler from other ski towns? Is it our massive Coast Mountain terrain? Maybe—however Europe and its rugged Alps have us beat in that regard. And no matter how many horizontal gondolas we string across that valley—this will never change.
Is it the record-breaking snow we’re known for? Maybe—although our southern neighbour Mt. Baker holds the annual snowfall record, and a dozen other ski areas beat Whistler, from Utah’s famed Wasatch Mountains to the legendary powder of Japan.
Is it the uniquely vibrant community of people that make Whistler a full-time home?
Maybe….we’re getting closer to the answer. Whistler is defined, in part, by all of these smaller details plus many more. But I want to argue for the most integral element of the Whistler genetic makeup. One that separates us and defines us. One of Whistler’s dirty little secrets. No, it’s not the carcinogen-spewing asphalt plant hidden behind our new LEED-certified Athlete’s Village.
I want to talk about rain.
From the inception of Whistler Mountain, rain has been an integral part of the Whistler experience. Original Whistler ski bums dubbed it “Pisstler Fountain”. And no matter how many lifts we build to a sea of majestic peaks accessing deep Coastal powder, Nelson B.C.’s dreadlocked powder snobs, and Utah’s slow-drawl U-tards…still call it Pisstler.
And then they laugh.
It’s hard to argue with them. In case you didn’t notice—It rains here. All the time.
During the Olympics, friends and family who had been watching the endless barrage of television coverage called me with concern in their voices.
“We heard you’re getting a lot of rain there,” They would say “Will they be able to hold the events?”
And I would answer “We always get rain, it’s the Pacific Northwest. You live in Vancouver, Mom.”
This isn’t Colorado, where skiers agonize over SPF ratings and ski turning radius.
It isn’t Europe, where men named Hans ski from mountainside bar to mountainside pub and watch other men named Hans ski mountaineer.
This isn’t even the Whistler you see in Whistler advertisements, helicopters zooming over happy people linking synchronized pow turns in the sun.
The real Whistler is dark, and cold, and wet—and not just in Garf’s.
Tourists often arrive to a valley choked with fog, mist and dense rainclouds. They awake in the early morning to the pitter patter (or the thundering hammer) of rainfall. From their hotel room, they strain to make out the massif of peaks and trees they’ve seen in magazine photos for years. A week later, they leave without seeing it.
I’m here to remind you that—yes, it rains in Whistler—All the time. And it’s a beautiful thing.
We hate rain because it makes our walk or bike ride to work unpleasant.
We love it because it means that very commute threads through towering Coastal rainforest on multiple lakeside trails.
We resent rain because we need to own expensive Gore-Tex to stay dry.
But we take pride in being the last to remain on the ski hill, making fresh turns while soaked-to-the-T-shirt tourists are long gone.
Rain is what keeps the hesitant hovering over their morning coffee while those in the know are putting tracks down Pacalolo and Fraggle Rock.
Rain is what makes the moss thick, the roots strong and the singletrack tacky.
Rain is the reason the weak leave. It’s the reason the passionate stay.
And it’s this fact that is the most important. Because a community’s worth is in the people that make it up. And the people that make up Whistler have made a choice to live with the benefits and the downfall of downpour.
As the theologian Saint Basil once said, “Many a man curses the rain that falls upon his head, and knows not that it brings abundance to drive away the hunger.”
Let us finally acknowledge the source of Whistler’s abundance, and embrace the true element that sets us apart.
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