This is the Treblecone mascot bird. A mountain parrot, the Kia will eat all the rubber from your car, and beg for your lunch. They flash a red underwing when they take off. You can get them to come close; they're not afraid.
This was our first day riding in New Zealand. Treblecone is about half an hour from Wanaka, up a crazy switchbacking road through the snowline and up into the weather. Here Rob Kingwill leads us to this drop into one of the many gullies at Treblecone.It had been snowing and raining (lower elevations) for our first two days, so we were waiting for the roads to clear and the powder to accumulate. Then we decided to go freeriding instead of riding SnowPark.
It was a wise idea. The snow was deep and we were able to find lots of cliff drops like this one. JP floats a big frontside air - probably the largest of our group, and the only one to ride it out down the fall line to the right - a skilled maneuver.