1/20 Ruff weather. "It snowed A LOT last night. Even Toby was having trouble making it through. So much fun." Photo by chrisleboe.
2/20 Strange weather. John Goldsmith, also known as Waxy, shot through a department store window to invent a bit of snow in the city during the 2010 Olympics.
3/20 "Scary traverse into Blackcomb Glacier," writes Judy B -- The Travelling Eye. "It takes nerve to bootpack it across the narrow trail into Blackcomb Glacier's patrolled backcountry, all the while risking a slide down into Blowhole's scary drop. Well worth it, though, to access the superb terrain."
4/20 Ice wine anyone? Boats snowed in at the docks in Kelowna. Taken in January of 2011 by Jason Drury.
5/20 "When I first moved here (from Miami), I was amazed to see familiar palm trees growing (in CANADA?!). They look even more bizarre when the snow is falling," writes Dan Fairchild, otherwise known as HereInVancouver.
6/20 "A good cause" is how jan gates labeled this photo taken in Vancouver, adding, "But the banner admonishing Norway also seemed a tiny bit absurd on this cold snowy morning."
7/20 Home on the frozen range. Barbed wire and fence posts in the snow in the Williams Lake River Valley, taken by cid56.
8/20 Onward to the South Pole! "I sort of liked this one," wrote DJ Huber of the shot he took of his sons in Surrey last month, "because it was a bit odd. Had a bit of an Antarctic exploration vibe to it."
9/20 Coffee on the back porch in Vernon. rick forgo took this on a January morning as part of a series documenting every day of a year.
10/20 "Gorgeous freshies down Whistler's Flute bowl." Judy B. - The Travelling Eye took this on Feb. 18 last year.
11/20 City under siege. Tom Weibe's wry caption: "A major snowfall in Vancouver has nearly 2 cm (!) of the white stuff on the ground in some parts of the city which has caused all life as we know it to grind to a halt. Perfect time for an alien landing. Only time will tell if they're friendly."
12/20 Snowy roller. The old wooden Coaster on the PNE grounds with a dusting of icing, taken by md&r.
13/20 Now that's one big hockey rink, but better bring a broom. Vaseux Lake in the Okanagan, by JeremyOK.
14/20 Icing on that? "Transit operator enjoys some Tim Horton's as others plan to rescue his bus from the snow," explains popeye logic of his downtown Vancouver image.
15/20 (s)no(w) stopping. "As seen at Snow Covers Sports, on Pine Street, Vancouver after the first snow of the season...brrrrr," annotates Jawdoc.
16/20 "Snow prints. Saw this on the way to work. The prints were made of compressed snow that had not melted yet," explains chaiwalla. Taken last month.
17/20 Huddled against the cold. Yue Minjun's public sculpture by English Bay in Vancouver by TravelsWithDan, who also goes by Dan Fairchild.
18/20 "Open to snow flurries." Close-up of that same Yue Minjun public sculpture, Vancouver, by HereInVancouver, who also goes by Dan Fairchild.
19/20 Light dusting at night. Taken in Steveston by Clayton Perry Photoworks.
20/20 "Where Do You Sleep?" is the title AlpineEdge (Christopher K) gives his picture shot atop Joffre Peak on a September Saturday. "Hoping to find a flat spot somewhere along the way, we brought our full packs up with us... A large block of corniced snow left us an almost perfect flat perch at 8,927 feet... After taking in the sunset we spent 5 minutes excavating a flat patch and voila, a million dollar view... It was awesome!"
Snow regrets. That's the lesson nature seemed to want to teach this week on the North Shore slopes above English Bay, where two years ago there wasn't enough of the white stuff to adequately blanket Cypress Mountain's Olympic Freestyle Ski Venue. Snow-hauling helicopters and strategically-placed hay bales saved the day and events did proceed, with Alex Bilodeau winning Canada's first gold medal of the Games on Feb. 14.
For any remaining skeptics, what we seek to establish with this photo essay is that it really does snow here in the winter. A lot. Pretty much everywhere in British Columbia, except for a few soggy spots along the coast.
In fact, here's what the same Cypress Mountain was reporting exactly two years after Bilodeau's coup. "Early this Valentine's Day morning it has been snowing heavily starting at about 4:30 a.m.!! We are very excited... looks like a great day shaping up on Cypress Mountain as we head into the second half of the season."
So don't let a flukey weather week two Februarys ago give you flakey ideas about our winter readiness. Click through the 20 images above to see what happens when you plug the tag word "snow" into the Tyee readers' Your BC: The Tyee's Photo Pool.
And, just to be crystal clear, may we remind you what we British Columbians almost always mean when we speak of helicopter skiing. The term indicates flying skiers by helicopter to a snow pack. Not (as during our Olympics) flying a snow pack by helicopter to skiers stuck with nothing to do on a muddy mountainside.
That was 2010, and we've slalomed on. Really, we have. Snow regrets.