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This is Sam McDougall and his daughter Millie. Sam is the head honcho, the big cheese, the figure of authority. When it comes to leading a crew of crazy Aussies Sam is the guy you want holding the reins. The only problem is that he's all too often out front! |
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Here's Sam getting geared up for a very important mission. Perhaps the most important mission of the season. Is it a lift evacuation? A cliff rescue? No, it's the patrol picture! |  |
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True to Aussie form however, Sam is never too busy to take a moment out for a cell call (I swear these guys will use text messaging to talk across a room). I think what he's saying up there is "Umm...you guys aren't going to run the chair for a bit, right?" |
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This is pretty much your standard Ossie shot. The grin is always there, and no matter what's going on it's "no worries, we can handle that!" |  |
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On any given day at 4:00 you can find Ossi with the rest of the patrol up at Koflers getting ready for sweep. It's easy to find Ossi, he's the one with the big grin and the hot dog in his hand (every day it's a hot dog, pretty much without fail). You can also find him on the hill by looking for the free heeled yodelling patroller. |
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Here's Ossi at the controls of a rescue over in Chute 1. A couple of kids had ignored all of the signs and gone over there in their ski boots. They promptly slipped off of the top and slid down about 50 meters or so and then discovered that they were too scared to move. Fortunately they had a cell phone, and fortunately guys like Ossie (and Matty, but we'll get to him in a bit) were around to go fish them out of there. Notice how even under the pressure of a rescue situation Ossi still manages to give the camera a bit of a grin while looking quite sylish with his cool shades and Ahhhnold Schwartzenegger buzz-cut hair. |  |
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The Buller patrollers have a phrase that they seem to use quite often. The phrase is "I don't know, ask Ed". Ed has an encyclopedic knowledge of, well, most things. You really don't need Google around if you've got Ed on your team! |  |
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This is Ed explaining something at the end of the day. I have no idea what he's explaining, nor does it really matter. The point is that pretty much no matter what the subject is, from local geography to world history, you can pretty much bet that Ed is going to be able to tell you something you didn't know. How does he do it? Well, opinions vary, but my guess is that he secretly stocks the refrigerator with his own special beer that's made out of colored water. That way while the rest of us are getting schnockered he's remaining sober and he just seems to be better informed than the rest of us. |
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When it comes to the actual work of patrolling, we'd be sunk without a cool hand on the microphone in the base station. Most of the time that hand was attached to Mel. Mel knows the ins, outs, ups, downs, lefts and rights of the whole operation which allows exchange patrollers to look much better than they really are ("Base to unit 10 Glen...the people you're looking for are 10 meters to your right"). Hmm...on the other hand maybe that doesn't make the exchange patroller look all that bright. |
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Here's Marsh early in the season. He's smiling because he's standing on the summmit on a beautiful day early in the season. Neither one of us had any idea how much rain and how little snow was to come. If you look just to his left (that's his left) you can see the other reason that he's smiling. That's Kofler's Cafe and he knows there's a bowl of spaghetti with his name on it waiting down there. |  |
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When you talk to Marsh, one of the things you'll be likely to hear him say is "You'll be laughing", which is his way of saying that you've suddenly found yourself in a great situation. Here's Marsh in a pretty great situation...the interior of a Dauphin twin turbine helicopter on the way to do some heli-skiing, ummm...I mean on the way to do some cliff rescue practice. |
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Here we see Marsh posing for the next issue of "Aussie Patroller". He's proving that you can do lift evac practice and still maintain your GQ image. What you can't see in this picture is how battered he is after being slammed into the chair on his ride down the cable. I suspect he's thinking about how he can get out of the chair and back down to some warm cozy cows. |  |
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Tim is very confused. He has the strangest, fattest skis that you'll ever see. In fact, they're so fat that he only uses one of them. He also seems to forget to put his ski boots on and generally wears these funny, very comfortable looking soft boots. To top it all off he stands sideways. He's usually grinning because his feet are comfortable! |
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Tim is probably one of the busiest guys on the hill. It's not enough that he's on the patrol, he also does camera work for the local media (his footage is commonly broadcast on the Melbourne news station) and produces a year-end video for the ski corporation. |  |
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Odds are that if there's a something cool going on, Tim will be there to put it on film. What you don't see are the hours and hours spent on all of the production work. Tim's typical day may start early in the morning to do a live feed for the news company, followed by a day of patrolling, followed by a trip to the summit for a sunset shot, followed by an evening of editing. Oh yeah, he might find a way to slip a beer or two in there somewhere. |
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I can't count the number of times that I ended up jumping on a snowmobile with Tim either before or after work to run up the mountain to catch a sunrise or a sunset. There were a lot of times that the lighting never worked out quite right and neither one of us got much of anything, and then there were other times that we both got cool shots (although Tim's shots moved while mine just stood still). Here's Tim on one such evening waiting to see if it was going to be worth breaking out the gear or not. |  |
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There were a lot of times that Tim and I would end up looking at a sunset and saying "Hey...go stand over there so that I can get a person into this shot". That's why I have all sorts of of pictures of a snowboarder dude (Tim) carrying skis. Here's one such picture of Tim up near the top of the Howqua chair. |
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And even though this isn't a picture of Tim, it is a picture that Tim took. This is a frame out of the video that Tim produced. It was taken in pretty much the same spot as the prior picture, except this time Tim was driving the camera and I was skiing through the frame (He kept saying "ski real slow" which is why I was skiing like a pigeon toed duck). |  |
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Nicole "Nickers" is the other half of the Tim and Nickers duet, which means that she gets to live in the patrol base with the rest of us. During the day she manages Speaky's Off Piste in the village and in the evenings she tries to maintain her sanity while surrounded by unsupervised ski patrollers. If Nickers ever says "you're welcome to have dinner with us tonight" the answer is "YES", it doesn't matter what the dinner is. Everybody down at Buller was great about helping me out whenever I needed anything, but Nickers is the kind of person who always goes the extra mile to make sure that you're "all sorted". |
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The first day I skied with Speaky he gave me a tour of the whole mountain. Since he's skied there pretty much forever he has all sorts of stories. As we skied around the mountain he kept pointing out where particularly bad accidents had occurred. Every one of the stories seemed to end with "..and they died.". I called it "Speaky's Dead Man's Tour of Mount Buller". Here's Speaky pointing out something...you can probably guess what it was. |
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Despite his nickname (his real name is Terry, but nobody seems to use it much, the closest the'yll come to that is "Tez"), Speaky doesn't say a whole lot. However he has this constant gleam in his eye that generally means that he's thinking of something mischevious. When you see this look you might want to start being a bit concerned. However since he pretty much always looks like this you just have to watch your back most of the time!. On this particular evening Eddy was the recipient of Speaky's scheming, but that's another story... |  |
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Hopefully this particular shot is not Speaky continuing his Dead Man's Tour. Instead I think he's just pointing out the stylish Squaw Valley Ski Patrol hat that he's wearing. |
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Nathan is Speaky's son. Or Speaky is Nathan's father. Either way it doesn't really matter since Nathan is busy forging his own reputation entirely separate from Speaky's. Nathan is yet another example of the "No Worries" approach to life that you find down at Buller. Whatever you need it just seems to somehow happen when people like Nathan are around. True to the Lyons family tradition, Nathan is seen here sporting a stylish Squaw Vally hat. |  |
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Nathan likes his toys. Like most of the other patrollers one of his favorite toys is a 14 million dollar Dauphin helicopter. Here's Nathan using sign language to describe (a) How he's feeling, (b) the direction he's about to travel, and (c) His expectation for how the rest of the day is going to go. |
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I managed to take a few turns with Nathan from time to time. Here's a shot from one of the rather rare powder moments that we had during the season. As you can tell from the photo, Nathan must have had a few face shots in waist deep powder because he's pretty much covered in snow... |  |
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...or there may be some other explaination for the snow clinging to all of Nathan's clothes. I was laughing so hard while I was shooting these pictures that I had no idea whether or not I'd gotten the shot. I did get the shot, and it was posted on the bulletin board in the patrol room immediately. |
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Donny was the first patroller that I met in Australia, mostly because he's the one that came and picked me up from the airport. |  |
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Donny's been around the hill as long as anyone and could probably ski the whole mountain with his eyes closed. That may be a good thing, because you won't find anybody who can outlast Donny at the Whitt after skiing. One of the things you learn rather quickly is to be careful about getting into a shout with Donny (no, that's not a yelling match, it's an Aussie drinking thing).You'll be lying under the table and Donny will still be grinning. |
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Cammo was the most recent Aussie export to Squaw so he and I were basically trading places across continental lines. He's equally at home with a stick of dynamite in his hand (well, maybe not at Buller) or a good bottle of wine and a kitchen full of food. |  |
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Here's Cammo explaining to me how patrolling in Australia is just like patrolling at Squaw. Well, except for the lack of snow. And the fact that it was raining buckets. And the funny looking trees. And the funny looking animals. And the fact that we really didn't know where we were at the time. But other than that it's exactly like Squaw! |
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Cammo and I covered night skiing on Saturday nights. I don't have a picture of night skiing (hey, it's dark and boring) and the truth of the matter is that patrolling at night is really mopping the floor, doing the dishes, taking out the garbage, and occasionally going for a spin on the snowmobile just because you'll go crazy if you don't get outside. This is obviously Cammo on a Saturday thinking about how much fun night skiing is going to be. Unless it's Cammo on any other day thinking about the fact that he doesn't have to mop the floor tonight! |  |
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Every patrol has to have a musician or two on the staff, and Matty holds down the position of patrol rock star. Here we see Matty with the musician essentials: a comfy couch, a good guitar, and a can of Jim Beam and Coke. From the look on his face you can tell that he's either had a long day patrolling, or the can is empty. |
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Even though he's a rock star, Matty is never too busy to spend some time with the common folks. Here's Matty with one of his biggest fans during an autograph session at the Hunt Club in Merijig (just down the hill from Buller). |  |
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Matty is the guy who seems to do most of the ropework and extrication training for the patrol. Here's Matty (right) making sure that Eddy and Cammo have a Z-drag system properly set up. |
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Occasionally some extra practicing is required in order to stay sharp. Here's Matty returning from one such "practice" session. His grin has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that he and Marsh had just gotten plucked off of the bluffs by the helicopter...honest! |  |
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Rob is the next victim, umm, patroller coming to Squaw. He'll be easy to spot, he'll be the one with the flaming helmet and the funny accent. Rob can do just about anything, from flying helicopters to driving cats to welding up parts for snowmobile trailers. Unfortunately I just don't have very many pictures of Rob, maybe it's because that helmet of his would make my camera's light meter go nuts. Guess I'll just have to catch him this season at Squaw! |
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Trail Crew Brad does all of the work that nobody else will do. He's out early in the morning whacking ice off of chairs, fixing snow fences, and generally getting stuck with all of the miscellaneous jobs that have to get done by somebody, and in this case he's got the lucky card. Guess it's cold work since he seems to be bundled up pretty well here. OK, so he's actually thinking "C'mon Glen, put down the stupid camera and let's get going!" |  |
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I'm pretty certain that Brad is somehow related to Billy Idol. I kept expecting him to break out into song and start sneering at the fans. To his credit, I don't believe he ever did either one of those two things. Brad is 1/2 of the "Brad and Katrina" pair. Katrina worked in the doctor's office (which is where both Brad and Katrina lived) which was about 30 steps from the patrol base. This is obviously way too far to travel, so in true Aussie form Brad is most likely sending a text message to Katrina. Either that or he's trying to figure out how to use his phone to actually speak to somebody (which as far as I can tell he never did). |
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This is Brad out in his element. It's a beautiful day, there's fresh snow, the skiing is great, and what's Brad doing? Digging out a bunch of roofing that had blown off of the buildings in the big storm. Actually Brad and I used our combined mental assets to determine that we should try to yank this sucker out with a snowmobile instead of spending our time digging. It was fun to try, but the end result was a broken rope, two pieces of tin where we started with one, and we had to do all of the digging anyway. |  |
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Andy is yet another Buller patroller who has done time at Squaw Valley. Out on the hill it's always a good time trying to keep up with him when he decides to cut loose (good luck...). Off the hill he assumes his secret identity as latex-man. Either that or he's wisely decided that anybody who would wear an Alpine Meadows sweatshirt should be doing anything possible to hide their face. |
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Andy's certainly not lacking for enthusiasm. Here's Andy during one of our helicopter rescue exercises where he, Cammo, and I managed to get very very wet but never got rescued. Obviously he's having a pretty good time which is pretty amazing considering that he's sopping wet, is in the middle of nowhere, isn't going to get winched out by a helicopter, and there's no snow to be seen. |  |
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Eddy is a classic. He's easy to spot, he's the king sized grin going mach 10 into the closed areas. If you're skiing with him you're likely to hear the words "trust me", which apparently is french for "We're about to go flying into a narrow rocky chute that will eat your skis." Here's Eddy carefully considering where he's going to go next. |
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This is the classic Eddy pose. Actually in this shot he was helping Matty cook dinner. Matty however had wisely decided that allowing Eddy to help with dinner was asking for yet another meal of carrots and onions (yes, that's an actual Eddy meal). |  |
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The grin is perpetual, and if you're skiing with Eddy you're probably grinning yourself because any time you're skiing with "Eddy From France" (hey, that's what his name tag said) you're having a great time. |
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Now I know this picture may appear to show a cheerful, caring, kind sort of soul. You know, the sort that would help little old ladies cross the street and all that. What you can't see is the lady he's helping has a big streak of mud down her back because she had just gone flying off of the run and across the road on her derrier. Tony was kind enough to help her, but it didn't keep him from laughing himself silly at the same time. |  |
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Tony kept trying to convince me that there were mythical creatures called "wombats" that actually inhabited the local runs. However none of these little critters ever appeared, which really doesn't surprise me. After all...would you trust a guy who finds humor in exploding ski runs? Yes, that's actually what happened here. A good portion of the run just plain erupted when one of the snowmaking pipes ruptured, making a huge hole and throwing up huge chunks of snow, which Tony obviously thinks is pretty cool! |
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Yet another one of the volunteer staff that always seems to be around is Arash. Arash is one of those sleepers that lulls you into a false sense of confidence, then the next thing you know he's putting strangely colored drinks in front of you and somehow convincing you that you really want to consume it. Arash was cool enough to let me crash at his house on my last night.The following day he drove me to the airport, making his the last Aussie patroller that I saw before leavving the continent. |  |
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Kofler's Cafe is in the Kofler Hutte which is up on the hill. It's far more than a place, it's even more than a tradition. It's something that has to be experienced. A typical patrol day involves not one, but two trips to Kofler's. The first is at 10:00 in the morning when you're going to have a big bowl of spaghetti (yes, I'm serious about that). The second is at 4:00 in the afternoon to prepare for sweep, which of course requires you to have a hot dog, some strudel, a latte, or maybe all of the above. |
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Here's a part of the crew at Kofler's. They're all certifiably insane, and they all treat the patrol like family. Any time you roll into Kofler's you're heading to good food and people that treat you like a friend from the first day they meet you. |  |
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Bob is the guy that gets to herd the cats at Kofler's. He and his wife Chris live at cafe with most of the crew, so it's not just a job...it's a life! |
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All of the Koflers crew were great, but the first face I'd see every morning was Michela. That's because she was the one that got stuck outside at the expresso machine. Michela makes a mean latte and it was always nice to know that even in the worst of weather you could get a cup of caffeine being served by a Checkoslavakian grin! |  |
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And on the inside I was likely to run into Emma and Danni who always have a cheery "G'day" and grins that could light up the room if the power ever went out. |
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So finally we get to the end of the narrative. If a picture is worth a thousand words then this web site is a book or two, but it's still not enough to explain the whole thing. I guess all I can say is that if you ever get the chance to do something like this, run...do not walk..to the nearest airport and get on the plane. You might end up getting to hang out with a bunch of maniacs like this crew! Thanks, and G'day! |  |