10/11 Tahoe Weather, Conditions, Stoke, and What's Up Thread

[Ottime]

KW was fun again yesterday. Lost Cabin was skiing excellent, with perfect conditions for huge sweeping turns at the top, and big slushy bumps through the throat. It is beautiful out this morning, and breakfast at the Inn was pure win.

[Nuthon]

Happy 4th yall. It's been a difficult spring. Watching all this late season snow & not being able to touch it. Enjoy the riding today. Just happy there may still be patches in Sept. when i get the go ahead from the doc on my knee.

[GrumpyPilot]

It took a while for someone to get the joke, if indeed you did. Congrats. KT wasn't even operating.

Yeah, I was wondering what the hell, but people do some crazy shit when it comes to the KT line. Nothing really surprises me anymore. I thought about your post when I drove into the valley yesterday to watch the Crossing antics and realized you were yanking peoples chain.

[dookeyXXX]

I went 4 under 4 on the 4th...I skied all 4 of the Lake Tahoe resorts that were open in under 4 hours.

Donner Ski Ranch - they get mad points and props for being hella scrappy (of all the resorts in Tahoe they exemplify Maggotdom to the max; i.e. what they lack in extreme terrain they more'n make up for in attitude). The frontside was totally burnt so you either had to drive your own 4x4 up to Chair 2 or take a "hay ride" in the bed of the owner's pick-up. Classic. I did two laps on their terrain, which was a mixture of groomed and suncups.

Sugarbowl - was only open to season passholders from 10/11 or 11/12. You had to hike into the village from Judah parking lot. The only chair running was Disney and most of the stuff on that side of the hill was semi-burnt. I ripped the lift line and bolted.

Alpine Meadows - Probably has the most skiable frontside coverage of all the resorts at the moment. They were spinning Roundhouse and Summit. I ran into Gone2Alpine and the Mrs., jla415, and Unpossible. Shared the lift with jla and Keith from Praxis and ripped a bugged out schizo line through Pete's Peril's Trees, across Sympathy Face, and through some more trees. "I've never skied that line before" remarked jla when we got to the bottom. I bolted shortly thereafter.

Squaw - Still holding up top and I skied Gold Coast about 3X looking for my pops, who is a Super Senior and was stoked to being skiing his first 4th since 1998 (sadly I didn''t get to do laps with him). Then I moved over to Shirley Lake (still looking for pops, who hadn't turned his celly on and unbeknownst to me had already bailed). At noon I hooked up with Corky and we did a run off Siberia. At the lift ran into this cat named Jason, whom I'd met on Sunday and the three of us hiked up to National, skied it and then traversed/hiked over to Headwall, which was money. Jason bailed and Corky and I ended up sluggin' cold brew-ha-ha's with Flexon Phil and SnowHot at High Camp.

Solid 4th all around.

[RaccoonFace]

^^^That is teh awesome!

okbye

[SchralphMacchio]

Glad the Tahoe crew had fun this 4th of July.

The forecast for 65+ mph above 12K on Shasta turned out to be serious bunk. MapleLeafGillies and Snowranger and I decided what the hell let's go for it anyways. We schlepped in our camp crap late Saturday afternoon, ripped 3 laps above Hidden Valley Sunday (thinking we would be held to low elevation by phantom cold winds), and skied from the summit all the way down to Bunny Flat today (with a pit stop at Hidden Valley to collect camp).

Oh wait, this is the Tahoe not Cascades thread ... but I will say that upper West Face is as smooth as a baby's bottom right now and skiing like hero snow. Fantastic true corn cycle up there - this morning's walk up to the top was too firm to even front point crampons - and the best damn July turns I've ever had. Let's not limit that to July ... the pitch from the top of West Face down to 10K feet was about as good as any corn I've ever skied anytime anywhere. From Hidden and below things are not worth skiing, and after tomorrow a little dry tooling will be required in places on the way up or down from Bunny Flat to 9K. But I do think Brewer Creek may be open soon ... east face of the upper mountain looked $$$ this morning.

[gone2alpine]

I went 4 under 4 on the 4th...I skied all 4 of the Lake Tahoe resorts that were open in under 4 hours. Solid 4th all around.

Great report Dooks. You are the model of maggotdom as well. PM sent on further plans...

[Flexon Phil]

What a day at Squaw!!! One of the top 10 days of the year combining some awesome spring (summer?) conditions with a fantastic party at High Camp.

[Vets]

I went 4 under 4 on the 4th...I skied all 4 of the Lake Tahoe resorts that were open in under 4 hours.

Donner Ski Ranch - they get mad points and props for being hella scrappy (of all the resorts in Tahoe they exemplify Maggotdom to the max; i.e. what they lack in extreme terrain they more'n make up for in attitude). The frontside was totally burnt so you either had to drive your own 4x4 up to Chair 2 or take a "hay ride" in the bed of the owner's pick-up. Classic. I did two laps on their terrain, which was a mixture of groomed and suncups.

Sugarbowl - was only open to season passholders from 10/11 or 11/12. You had to hike into the village from Judah parking lot. The only chair running was Disney and most of the stuff on that side of the hill was semi-burnt. I ripped the lift line and bolted.

Alpine Meadows - Probably has the most skiable frontside coverage of all the resorts at the moment. They were spinning Roundhouse and Summit. I ran into Gone2Alpine and the Mrs., jla415, and Unpossible. Shared the lift with jla and Keith from Praxis and ripped a bugged out schizo line through Pete's Peril's Trees, across Sympathy Face, and through some more trees. "I've never skied that line before" remarked jla when we got to the bottom. I bolted shortly thereafter.

Squaw - Still holding up top and I skied Gold Coast about 3X looking for my pops, who is a Super Senior and was stoked to being skiing his first 4th since 1998 (sadly I didn''t get to do laps with him). Then I moved over to Shirley Lake (still looking for pops, who hadn't turned his celly on and unbeknownst to me had already bailed). At noon I hooked up with Corky and we did a run off Siberia. At the lift ran into this cat named Jason, whom I'd met on Sunday and the three of us hiked up to National, skied it and then traversed/hiked over to Headwall, which was money. Jason bailed and Corky and I ended up sluggin' cold brew-ha-ha's with Flexon Phil and SnowHot at High Camp.

Solid 4th all around.

Pretty good, but why didn't you also drive down to Mammoth? ;-)

[Flexon Phil]

Pretty good, but why didn't you also drive down to Mammoth? ;-)

And he could have hit Kirkwood on the way. Slacker.

[madturtle]

But I do think Brewer Creek may be open soon ... east face of the upper mountain looked $$$ this morning.

They closed it?!?! Who? Those bastards.

[SchralphMacchio]

Sorry, I should have said "clear" rather than "open."

According to the rangers, there were big drifts of snow on the road making it impassible. However, with the heat the last few days that snow should have started to disappear and be easier to clear. Like I said, upper east face is untouched and SO FILLED IN. If the West Face is any sort of proxy - no texture of any sort until about 9700' and even then still a good ski down lower - then the East and North faces will be going great for a while. Go out and get it while it's still freezing at night!

[Jack Burton]

Brewer was ~ 6 miles out on Saturday, but we were able to skin from the car up the actual Brewer creek bed as opposed to the road with 10 minutes of walking all told. My guess is two weeks to drive significantly further, and that every couple days will add ~ 10 minutes of walking to snow up the brewer drainage.

The east face of the upper mountain was $$$ on Saturday at high noon.

[SchralphMacchio]

Brewer was ~ 6 miles out on Saturday, but we were able to skin from the car up the actual Brewer creek bed as opposed to the road with 10 minutes of walking all told.

Thanks for the clarification JB. 6 miles up the creekbed to the top???

I think my skis are getting their summer wax soon ... enough accumulated driving and work for turns, it's time for beach barbeques!

[TurxSki]

These KW pics make me so glad to be skiing Alpine Meadows this weekend.

WORD.
The surprise was it was real skiing. The snow is holding up well.
I was stoked to get last chair on Saturday I liked how the tree-wells are now snow bridges

This might be part of that same line Dookey was talking about:

[TahoeBC]

Echo Lake opened over the weekend in case any of you die hards want a quick way into the Desolation and the snow pack is still pretty fat. At $10 bucks each way it's starting to get a bit steep and you need 3 people for them to run the Taxi, we got this nice guy to drive us across in the AM today and Skied Baldy and Ralston.

[dookeyXXX]

Way to get after it TahoeBC...$10 each way, though?! I wonder if they upped the taxi fare at Saddlebag Lake this season, too? Oh yeah, did you skin at all or was it hiking and boot-packing all the way?

As for current weather?

Can you say thunder and rain in Truckee? Yup...it's been rumbling for about an hour and just now starting to make things wet (4:35 p.m.).

[Jack Burton]

"Thanks for the clarification JB. 6 miles up the creekbed to the top???"

Down trees and snow 6 miles from the Brewer Creek trail head. The creek bed makes for a direct approach cutting off the switch backs 2 - 3 hours to the bottom of good skiing & 4 or 5 up from there.

"I think my skis are getting their summer wax soon ... enough accumulated driving and work for turns, it's time for beach barbeques! "- Yup I don't intend to put my feet in ski boots again until November, unless Squaw opens for another powder day.

[enlosandes]

Mrs. ELA about to rip the shit out of Granite Chief Peak this weekend, good times!

[LegoSkier]

Alpine was excellent on the 4th.
Anyone else see the bear wandering around mid mountain? Poor guy was wondering wtf all these strange things were sliding through his house. That or he was wondering which one would be the tastiest.

[powpig]

Was looking south from the Palisades yesterday and scoping out the Barker Pass area, lookin' pretty fat! Can't imagine the road is clear to the top, anyone been up that way and can give a first hand report? Thanks!

[SchralphMacchio]

MapleLeafGillies, I, and snowranger honored America's birthday on top of a volcano on Monday (yes, someone forgot their summit beer)


Turns from 14,150' down to 6,900' on the 4th? Not bad!

[powdork]

first off, this is the tahoe thread. that shit ain't even the sierra, or the sierras for that matter.
second - that ain't beer, son.
this weighs the same (and it's of tahoe)

hell, i would have carried all three if i got a phone call...

and tahoeBC, thanks for the invite. looks like it was fun and good.

[TahoeBC]

Oh yeah, did you skin at all or was it hiking and boot-packing all the way?

We brought skins and could have used them some, but once you hit the snow line it starts out as a boot and the booting was good so we were to lazy to switch over.

[skier666]

I'm working on a few delayed TRs....all in the Sierra....stay tuned.