8/8/2010

FABULOUS experience with this company.

All 11 of us were inexperienced, but the guides were very attentive and encouraging to those of us who were more nervous. As with Wedge Rafting, the guides were very safety oriented, while extremely fun.

Apparently, an ATV goes over an embankment/cliff or has an accident every couple of days! Not due to negligence on the company's part, but just because! The guides were very "by the book" in terms of rescue/medical procedure, and when one of our companions fell off an edge and lost her ATV (10 minutes into our tour!), they knew exactly how to react and take care of the situation calmly, without frightening the rest of us.

It's relieving to know that the reason why you pay a lot for these kind of tours, is because the insurance totally covers accidents like this.

The guides go through the instruction on how to operate the ATVs, pretty quickly and I felt very overwhelmed during the spiel, but our guides personally stopped to talk to us individually as often as we needed, to make sure we felt confident.  I really appreciated that the guides seemed to be able to tell how nervous someone might be, simply by how they're driving.

Our guide stopped to reassure one of our companions, and give driving tips quite often in the beginning and by the end we were all feeling pretty confident. 2 minutes in, and I personally felt like a pro!

We also got to have a cute little deli lunch in a yert next to a lake half way through the ride!

And once we were all more confident, I did notice that our guide took us about a little faster. "We go as fast as our least confident rider".

Absolutely awesome experience!

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8/13/2008 2 photos

My personal moment of glory at Whistler was flying down the ziplines.  But, by far our family's highlight was the ATV tour.  We chose the Alpine Sunrise tour which left at a very early 8:20a, but it was worth rising early.  They have different types of tours (ATV, Hummer, Canoe, Snowmobile, etc.) throughout the day and evening as well, but most of the others were booked up well in advance.

If you are taking young kids, go to their office ahead of time to make sure they can ride.  My little guy (6) barely made the cut-off.  Parents drive and kids sit behind.  At first I was worried about the little guys hanging on, but there is a curved seat so they are pretty secure back there. We went with another family and guide.  One of their teenagers got to drive and the younger one was a passenger (I think you have to be 16 or 18 before they let you drive your own ATV).  

The tour was awesome.  They take you up to a hut part way up the mountain and get you outfitted in tons of protective gear.  You can see why if you look at my photo, since part of the ride had us splashing through HUGE puddles.  

We stopped several places during the tour for photo ops -- the top of Blackcomb, by a waterfall and when we spotted bears on the mountain.  The only problem with the tour was the relentless begging for ATVs by the kids when we returned home.

Listed in: Whistler-in Dixie

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2/16/2009

We enjoyed a snowmobile tour with Outdoor Adventures last year on a day off from skiing. The equipment was all new(er) and the staff was professional. We took a 2 hour tour that included a lot of time on a big frozen lake, running high speed laps. A few of us got up over 100kph, which is plenty fast for some inexperienced sled riders.

The trail system that Outdoor Adventures uses wasn't quite as fun as the tour we used this year - Blackcomb Snowmobiles. Not that it was bad, but the views and terrain from Blackcomb were simply better.

I'd recommend Outdoor Adventures if Blackcomb was full up, and its certainly not a bad group to go with if they have a tour that sounds interesting to you. Either way, snowmobiling is a great way to spend a day off from skiing or boarding.

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