RemyScalza.com: Independent Journalism

Olympic Winos: Great grapes at Vancouver 2010

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Vancouver’s Winter Games have an official credit card, cola and cold medicine, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that there’s an official wine gracing Olympic tables.  Last week, I had a chance to cover the Olympic wine scene for Wine Spectator.  Among the highlights: discovering North America’s first Aboriginal-owned winery, tasting with Napa Valley wine royalty Margrit Mondavi and sampling the Olympics’ own brand of bubbly.   The reporting was included in a special Olympic Unfiltered column on WineSpectator.com.

Olympic Champion Lindsey Vonn says, ‘Cheese!’

WineSpectator.com

Inside the big Indian longhouse erected in the heart of downtown Vancouver, a bit of Olympic history is taking place. Vancouver 2010 marks the first Olympic Games ever in which an Aboriginal community—Canada’s First Nations peoples—has participated as an official host. Guests at the Chief’s House, as the quirky, postmodern Aboriginal Pavilion is known, enjoy traditional Inuit throat singing, buffalo burgers and wines from North America’s first native-owned winery . . . .

Click here for the full article on the Wine Spectator site.

A Dry Olympics? Canadian Booze Prices Could Sober Festivities

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Host city for the 2010 Winter Olympics, Vancouver has some of North America's highest alcohol prices.

Host city for the 2010 Winter Olympics, Vancouver has some of North America's highest alcohol prices.

Vancouver is ranked world’s most livable city for good reason.   The international throngs set to descend in February for the Winter Olympics will no doubt be awed by the city’s setting, between snow-capped mountains and the green-gray waters of the Pacific.  They’ll marvel at its sleek, modern architecture and efficient public transport.  And they’ll probably warm right up to that earnest Canadian charm.  But sooner or later, Olympic fans are going to get thirsty and discover Vancouver’s dirty little secret:  exorbitant alcohol prices. [Read more…]

Whistler's Wild Side: The backcountry behind Canada's alpine mecca

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Outside of Whistler's Olympic Village, chalets and ski slopes give way to farmland and rugged hiking trails.

Outside of Whistler, chalets and ski slopes give way to farmland and rugged hiking trails.


Whistler, host of the 2010 Winter Olympics, is Canada’s uncontested capital of alpine chic.  The ski village, year-round population 10,000, has six five-star hotels, a thriving SUV limo service and bars full of ski bums sipping $16 martinis.  But venture a bit outside of town and the wilderness closes back in.  On the drive north from Whistler, million-dollar chalets quickly give way to much humbler accommodations scattered on Indian reserves.  Then – suddenly – there’s nothing at all, just a thin shoelace of asphalt rising steadily into the mountains.

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Dodging Black Bears in Whistler's Olympic Village

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Host of the 2010 Winter Olympics, the village of Whistler in British Columbia is also home to glacial lakes and several provincial parks.


Bear bells are standard equipment for hikers in this part of Canada.  The bells – which look a lot like Christmas ornaments – are hung from backpacks and belts.  They give off a tinny jingle meant to scare off any bears in the area . . . unless they like Christmas music.

I always thought people with bear bells were a little paranoid.  Then I came to Whistler.  The site of the 2010 Winter Olympic Games, Whistler – which is just two hours by car from Vancouver – isn’t exactly a rugged wilderness.  In the swanky ski village, you’ve got your choice of five-star hotels, multiple sushi bars and plenty of alpine-chic clubs with techno music and antler chandeliers.

But just outside the village, the mountains close back in.  A network of provincial parks links snow-covered peaks with glacial lakes and huge tracts of unsettled wilderness.  All of which is great for hikers and also, apparently, for bears.   Driving to a trailhead on the outskirts of town, I see my first black bear of the trip.  It’s six feet from nose to tail, with a head the size of a toaster oven.   As I drive by, it ambles up a highway embankment with the unhurried walk of an animal at the top of the food chain.

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