New Year in the mountains

Kimberley Trch Light Parade

There we were, loading our main chairlift with skis and snowboards on, each of us holding two flares in our hands. What for? We were about to perform New Year’s Torchlight parade – a long lighting snake coming down the hill …

torch-light-parade-Kimberley
Photo by: ‎Shannon Bjarnason

From the top of the lift we skated towards Kootenay Haus where we would wait till the end of public night skiing and for the Ski patrol to turn off all lights on the hill. We were excited, curious and just a little afraid that we might slip on the icy patches and go rolling down as one big burning ball.

Nevertheless, the time came to strap in our bindings and line up at the top of the hill, skiers first and us snowboarders in the back. For a few moments I actually regretted not having two sharp edges instead of just one. We lit on our flares and held them, one in each hand. I stood up and followed the person in front of me. We skied and snowboarded down in wide turns, creating one big snake made of light.

It was dark but the flares were lighting the way for us. It was cold but we didn’t feel that, the moment was too extraordinary to sense anything else, the moment was ours. Such were the last hours of 2016!

Video by: Estrid Jurlander

Kimberley Trch Light Parade
Photo by: ‎Lisa Ehm
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