Slow Start, but Nice Ending

Hello Skiers and Snowboarders,

Talk in the locker room, at an ungodly early hour this morning, included questions about the wind speeds above Alpine and Wolverine Bowls. It appeared obvious that Summit Chair might not be turning at the opening. As it turned out, both Summit and Alpine Bowl Chair were not spinning at the opening. We could see clouds of snow reaching into a clear blue sky at the ridgeline. The question was regarding our time at the resort. How long were we going be on the mountain, if all the lifts were not operating? We were gathered in our locker room, extra early, in an effort to obtain reasonably close parking spaces, and avoid the huge crowd that all of us expected. Lines were going to be long. they would be extra long if Summit and Alpine Bowl were not running. They were not open when we sat down on Roundhouse just before 9am.

Everyone I knew was bundled up in their warmest clothing due to the relatively low temperatures reported by NOAA. It appeared to be 20 degrees at the base and 13 degrees at the top of Summit Chair. In addition to the relatively low temperatures recorded at 8am., winds were howling between 71 mph and 96mph.

The fearful word for the day was “Lines”. At certain time of day there were unpleasant lift lines. The longest lift line that we sat in was at Sherwood. I believe it was between 15 and 20 minutes. The line at the base of Lakeview was also pretty long, and the lift line at TLC just looked frightening at one point in the morning. I was told the line for the B2B Gondola was 20 minutes, if you were leaving from the Squaw Valley base. I found it hard to believe that the lines at Scott, and Roundhouse were not excessive. The line for food at the Alpine Chalet looked ominous around 11am.. On the bright side, there were some awfully good lines on the ski hill.

If you like moguls and skier packed winter snow, then Our Father, Gentian, D7, D8, Palisades, and other shaded slopes were perfect today. Most of the groomed trails were in good condition with the exception of those that were a little firm from the combination wind sweeping across them, or from the warmth and sun that might have softened them yesterday and frozen them overnight.

The good news was that later in the morning, when the wind died down, and Summit and Alpine Bowl Chairs opened, most of the mountain was open to skiers and boarders. Keyhole slopes have not opened this year, as the snow depth is still not great enough. Yesterday we snuck out into the backcountry via one of the area’s lifts, and enjoyed a pleasant run where few tracks could be seen in front of the skier while foot deep soft snow left marks behind the skier. Today, I found a few small patches of gently used snow within the ski area boundaries, but most of the past few day’s snow fall has been well trampled.

Although there were more than plenty of skiers and snowboarders on the hill today, the fact that the sky was clear and eventually all lifts were spinning, allows me to say that today was a very good day on the slopes.

A word of caution for anyone who is not familiar with Reserve Parking at Palisades Tahoe and Alpine Meadows, and is considering purchasing a daily ticket. The Palisades at Tahoe app that I use on my phone offers a botton to click to purchase lift tickets. No mention is made of the need to reserve parking on weekends and holidays until after you have purchased the ticket. There is a button to click to reserve parking on the app, but it is further down the list of options available to search such as ski lessons, places to eat, stores, and maps. I was told that you receive notice of the need for parking reservations when the confirmation of your ticket purchase is sent. It seems to me that you would want to make a parking reservations prior, or at the same time that you were purchasing a lift ticket, especially on a day like today when all parking was full. A friend in our locker room brought this up so I thought I would pass along the issue.

Enjoy your day,
Andy

Editors Notes: A couple of late additions arrived in our inbox. Here’s the parking lot shuttle lines at 4:25. Also a friend posted a video showing the line for the B2B to go back to Palisades extending almost back to Kangaroo, well beyond 4pm.