Our tour went a short couple of hours drive up the road from Vancouver today along the scenic (and twisty) Sea to Sky Highway, to Whistler. And Wow!
Whistler is a ski resort (think Thredbo but much bigger) which hosted the 2010 Olympic and Para-Olympic Winter Games. And it's gorgeous! It was somewhat cloudy so the scenery wasn't as spectacular as Banff but as a package it had it all!
The village is closed to traffic and so is very pedestrian friendly with hordes of people wandering along The Village Stroll just ...... well strolling. It has been very obviously spiffed up for the Games with beautifully facaded shops and facilities and loads of newish accommodation. There were the Olympic rings, an Olympic Park with a band performing, stacks of eateries etc and it was jiving as it was a long weekend. We sat at a brasserie for dinner and watched the Whistler world go by!
This included thousands and we mean thousands of mountain bikers because as well as being a winter ski resort, Whistler is a mountain bikers haven in Summer and Autumn with many long and varied trails. The bikers rode up in the chairlifts some of which had dedicated bike carriers, and then they rode to the bottom where they could do some running repairs from one of the repair stations or wash their bike at the wash bay. Even entire families were participating!
But for us we chose to take the standard gondola chairlift to the top of Whistler Mountain and go on the Peak2Peak gondola ride. Words fail me here..... but I'll try. This is a gondola ride between two peaks, Whistler Mountain and Blackcomb Mountain (hence the name Peak2Peak).The gondolas, some of which have glass floors, travel along cables which are unsupported for nearly 3.1kms, that is 3.1 kms between towers supporting the cables. This makes it the longest unsupported cable ride in the world. As you can imagine, the cables dip a long way before going back up to each supporting tower, like a piece of rope being held at each end. It's a total of 4.4kms between the two peaks all up. All this at a height of 436m above the valley below. It's breathtaking!
It was cold at the top but we were suitably rugged up and to top the day off we saw some critters up the top - a marmot (marmots whistle to warn other marmots of impending danger giving Whistler its name) and a small 'pika', and two separate wild black bears with a single cub each on the way back down in the chairlift. Could it get any better? We had our afore mentioned 'people watching' dinner and wandered back along The Village Stroll. It doesn't get much better than today!