Fernie 11 Week Instructor Course 16/17 - Week 1

Heather is taking a break from her career as a graphic designer and, being a passionate snowboarder, decided to join us in Canada on our 11 week instructor course in Fernie. Heather will be blogging about her experiences and we can’t wait to hear what she gets up to.

First of all, let me address the elephant in the room: I’m nursing an injury. I managed to break my wrist on the very last run of the afternoon on my first day out. So as you can imagine my first week here hasn’t gone entirely how I envisaged it! However, the kind of break I’ve suffered is by no means season-ending, my doctor here assures me it is healing well and all signs point to a return to snow next week!

Canada has always held a particular fascination for me, even long before I began snowboarding in my early teens. The outdoor culture, the proximity to nature and ‘the wilderness’, is a far cry from where I’ve grown up in the outskirts of Belfast. To finally be in Canada and be immersed in life here is nothing short of a dream come true. And I mean that in the most sincere, un-cliched way possible! To also learn that Canadians are some of the friendliest, most polite people you could encounter just affirms my initial curiosities about this amazing country.

Nonstop’s 11 week instructor course seemed like the perfect opportunity for me to experience Canada properly whilst snowboarding as much as possible. It’s not my intention to turn snowboard instruction into a career (I’m a very happily employed graphic designer), but the level of on snow experience and knowledge I stand to gain is more than I could hope to achieve if I’d tried to organise a winter season by myself. A structured, well planned season managed by experts was a much more promising pursuit.

I arrived into Calgary with the majority of the other Nonstoppers on Saturday 14th. It’s funny now to think back to the mild apprehension that I and I’m sure the others were facing as we timidly introduced ourselves. Laden with luggage, our host Matheson rounded us up into our house groups and informed myself and my three other housemates that we were on the bus first, because our house was the last stop; was that a good or a bad thing? A four hour transfer followed, allowing plenty of time to start to get to know the people we’d be spending the next three months with, an hour or so into the journey the once lively, chatty bus was now a silent sleeper carriage, being buffeted by cold winds on both sides. I woke suddenly to find we had arrived. I love when I arrive in a place in the dead of night, it’s always a surprise in the morning. As it happens, last stop was no bad thing! The house was a very spacious, open plan living area with incredible views, as we discovered the next day. We hastily unpacked, figured out our sleeping arrangements and sank into bed.

Fernie is a beautiful little mountain town, you are surrounded by snowy peaks in every direction, the landscape is colossal. Our first morning was spent having an early guided tour of town, mostly of 2nd Avenue, or the main street where the majority of the stores and restaurants are. This gave us the opportunity to grab any gear we needed. I had bought my board from the guys at Edge of the World a couple months back, so it was exciting to finally have it in my hands all set up and ready to go! That evening we had dinner in our lesson groups with our instructors, it was nice to get to know everybody and share our goals for the season.

The first turns in a new resort on a brand new board are always going to be a bit nerve wracking. That quickly dissipates when you realise you can in fact still snowboard, the snow is the softest and lightest you’ve ever ridden and your brand new board, that you bought on the advice of someone you’ve only had limited contact with, feels like it was made for you. ’That thing has a brain!’, I exclaimed to Lars at Edge of The World when I saw him a few days later. Shop guys know their onions. Our instructor Alex was keen to take us down as many runs as possible, showing us the terrain and helping us to form a mental map of the resort. The pace of the day was ideal, not too intense but with a pinch of trepidation now and again to keep it exciting and progressive, it was one of the better days I’ve had on snow, despite the wrist incident.

On Friday I got to experience my first ice hockey game, Fernie versus Creston. We lost sadly, but the skill and prowess wasn’t lost on me, the speed is staggering. We’re hoping for a better result when we come up against big rivals Kimberly in the next match!

Saturday was Avalanche Safety Training (AST) theory day, and the first of the MORE activities I’ve signed up for. At first the thought of sitting in a classroom from 9am to 5pm seemed daunting, but I found it very interesting and as the lesson went on it became more and more obvious that knowledge like this is crucial when you come to a place like Fernie and want to experience the backcountry areas. What I’ve learnt so far will compliment my experiences cat boarding and heli boarding in the coming weeks. I’m really looking forward to the AST field day when we can put everything we’ve learned into practice.

To round up, it’s been a fantastic week full of new experiences and forming great friendships. Already, I know it’ll sting to leave this place.

Experience the Legend of Fernie

If you're feeling inspired by Heather's adventures, discover Fernie and all the ski and snowboard courses we offer here. Renowned for its terrain and deep snow, as well as an authentic Canadian mountain town vibe, there couldn't be a better place to spend the winter.

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