What a year – I’m just back from Whistler for my third time this year!

I was in Whistler with my team at work – or 6 of us from our team anyway! It’s been well over a year since we had a meetup and I didn’t realize just how long overdue it was. And the timing was incredible, having just gotten back from my sabbatical and struggling a bit to re-engage. I’m so engaged now, I was up working at 5:30am twice this week just because I was really in the groove!

This time of the year, it’s tricky flying in and out of Dawson City, due to the fog and low clouds. That meant the flights never nicely lined up, so I overnighted in Whitehorse both directions.

I headed out on Sunday afternoon, after a busy weekend for the annual museum auction (I’ll blog about that too, eventually! I know I’m behind!).

I was staying across the road from the airport, in the old Airport Chalet. It’s half the price, or even less, of any other motel in town. It’s ancient. But I sleep well, there is a great restaurant (think truck stop food), bar, parking, decent selection of tv channels, and it’s a less than half kilometer walk from the airport luggage carousel to your room.

I had never tried walking down town from there before though, but this time I figured it out! There is a set of stairs behind the airport. I set out to find them, didn’t, but found a great switchback trail down the embankment.

I wandered around, went to Mark’s, Walmart, the grocery store. I got some supper at the grocery store and then paid for a cab back up to the motel. I couldn’t shop much, because anything I bought was going to have to come with me. But I did find the larger circular knitting needle I needed.

The next morning I had a morning flight down to Vancouver.

It was an overcast day. I had an hour to regroup in the airport, and then boarded a shuttle bus coach to Whistler. I sat on the wrong side of the bus for all the views (dummy!) but the sun did come out and it was a beautiful fall day.

I was the first of our team to arrive. It’s considered off-season in Whistler, and the hotel deals were incredible! For $40 more a night than the Airport Chalet shown above, I checked into my suite! I had a fireplace! And a dishwasher! The tub was almost 6 feet long (yes I had a hot bath in it!), and a heated bathroom floor!

With no one else arriving until the evening, I wandered around the village and went shopping.

There is snow already on top of the peaks, but the lifts don’t open for a few more weeks. The restaurants had deals all week. Three-course meals for $44. And the food was extravagant! Here are some of my highlights:

The clouds came in the first morning. Here was the 7:30am view from my suite:

We managed to have a chilly hike together in the afternoon.

And then it poured rain the rest of our time in Whistler. Rain at 3°C is kinda miserable.

The trip back was pretty uneventful. There was no direct flight back to Dawson City, though. I had to do the long trip up to Inuvik and Old Crow and then, fortunately, we were able to land in Dawson City, because it was snowing like crazy.

Overall, excellent trip, smooth travel, great time with my coworkers, and I’m back in the game, charged up about our work, full of ideas, and ready to go!