This is IT!!!! The final MDTV for 2007. Robett Hollis and Will Jackways were joined by young guns Jorum Makuru and Conner Harding and headed into the Cardrona backcountry. The last on-hill footage for the year!! SO CHECK IT OUT ALREADY!!!

The Crew – Will Jackways, Jorum Makuru, Tim Pierce, Conner Harding and Holler
PHOTO: Tim Pierce – www.dystomedia.com

The day started with a text from Will J saying John Melville from Cardrona was up the hill and could help us out with some transport. We rounded the troops at Will J’s with some of the infamous Snowmafia aka Napisan Plus Mafia rolling around with Jorum on his ghetto fresh bike with boots around his neck and Conner rolling in some stolen looking Snow Mafia Truck.

We made it up the hill and hooked up with John and Steven at the Groomer sheds. A quick gear check and plan and we were set. We got a ride up over to the top of Captains basin via Queenstown return on the back of the groomer and made our way across the ridge heading towards the top peak of Cardrona. First stop was a rock boost out bomb drop into a pond skim. Jorum got his growing rarotongan legs in overdrive, made the gap and almost across the pond. Classic!

Next spot was the infamous lil rock gap jump were many a photo has come out of. Jah Harris’ back 1 cover sequence, Joel Westcott hammers etc etc. A quick bit of shoveling around by the boys and we were good to go. It was a fun lil double line and work out sweet. Conner threw the illest front 3 off his toes, Will got a dope back 1 and it was a rad quick session.

A bit of lunch and I scoped a thread the needle lil line between some rocks. Something different! After that it was time to move on so we hiked up the ridge to lookout over Queenstown and Wanaka. AMAZING!! Then Conner stepped up next with a beast of a rock gap bomb drop! Props!!

Then it was hammer time!! We had scoped out this melted formed lake from across the valley and Will J named it “Avacado Lake” due to the obvious shape but with a smaller inner section made of ice and totally surrounded by water. I was up first to christen it, went WAY to fast and got bounced once I hit “Avacado’s” center ice and rag dolled across the lake ending upside down in the middle of the lake submerged head first in the freezing cold water. Drenched from head to toe – I got straight up JACKED!!! All my gear was done and I had no change so I was like “I’m gonna get it!!”. Pretty much got ROCKED AGAIN on Round 2 with the middle ice section eating me for breakfast. Jorum helped the cause and broke up the dreaded center and 3 time lucky was the call and I finally made it across.

It was time for fun with everyone hitting it up. The highlight was Will J with a perfect mid waterride front 1 butter to revert out of the lake. It was 6pm by now so the call was made to bounce only leaving a 30 minute hike to get out of the valley. Nothing like a rock climb after a big days hiking and riding. ahha.

We made it back down to the base with a few slushy turns in the arvo sun and finished off what I would call the most productive and funnest ending days ever. We left the car park at 7:20pm and made our way back to Wanaka. It was all high fives and celebrations back at Will’s until we got the word from Tim Pierce that our last tape we’d been filming on went bust and all our footage that everyone worked so hard on could be ALL GONE!!!!! GUTTED!!! So in this episode you actually won’t see everything that went down in it’s entirety but I think you get the idea that the day was epic and a SUPER FUN one at that!!!

WATCH MDTV EPISODE 19 HERE

So that’s if for MDTV for 2007. Thanks to you all for watching throughout the year. A big ups to Tim Pierce from Dystomedia for making this puppy a reality, to all the NZ resorts who have supported us, to the staff at Snow Park NZ, Cardrona, TC and The Remarkables for the top effort when we all rolled up, to all the kiwi shredders who threw down and made it happen and a final HUGE big ups to MD for backing this thing in it’s first season!!!! CHEERS HEAPS!!!!!!!

Liked what we’ve been up to? Well, NZsnowboard.com is producing a FREE DVD to come out with the May/June 2008 issue of NZ Snowboarder Magazine which will have a 2007 highlights show as well as a full TUITION EDITION – Trick Tips 101 video. This Trick Tips Film features all of NZ’s best riders includingLouis Purucker, Abby Lockhart, Will Jackways, Bevan Hall, Nick Brown, Jake Koia, Karl Dunham, Robett Hollis, Nick Hyne and Mitch Brown giving you all some tips and trick basics for jibbing and jumping. Dystomedia is going full speed on that at the moment so it will be great to see when it finally comes out next May.

ANYWAYS – THANKS FOR WATCHING and SUPPORTING MDTV!!

Bring on 2008 – BIGGER and BETTER we hope!!!! Peace.

- Holler, NZsnowboard.com

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