Mt. Hood Snow Sports

This awesome article was written by Justin Kious, a local on Mt.Hood, and a great photographer. He's done a lot of work for Arbor Snowboards, Timberline, Axiomatic, and other companies as well! We're stoked to publish Justin's trip to Chile!

Snowboarding in august, an amazing concept for any of us who have put the old pow stick in the closet for the usual four months of the year. going on a last minute whim, with faith in my longtime friend byron bagwell, we embarked on our chilean adventure. getting on a plane in seattle where it was a nice summertime temp of about 85, and getting off in santiago, chile where it was about 40 was quite shocking. after a cab, bus, and a squished ride with a couple other gringos, we arrived at our destination of Las Trancas. with nothing more than a mile marker reference, we wandered down a muddy, pothole infused road for about half a mile, only to find an empty hostel, a woman was sweeping the floor, she spoke no english, between byron and i, our spanish was okay at best. we hitched up to the hill the next morning. what we saw before us as we crested the horizon, was amazing endless terrain, wind-effected lips everywhere, coulairs, and seemingly active volcanoes spitting about. lapping 6 inches of fresh, run after run, sussing out lines, drops everywhere, we had made it to nevados de chillan.

locals treated us with nothing but love, spoiled us with endless bbq's, and showed us the beauty the chilean ande's have to offer to a couple of dirtbag gringos. our friend diego said" i just want to show you how beautiful my country is," after i explained to him the whole "local," vibe that's quite prevenlant at most ski areas in the states. although we never recieved significant snowfall on our trip of 3 weeks, we had an overall wonderful experience, and will return next year, for a longer stay. if you're reading this, you should definitely go to chile! just don't tell anyone else how good it is.