Hello Winter, My Old Friend

Slowly but surely, our old friend winter is returning to California, resulting in our first “sort of” powder day in 5 weeks at Alpine Meadows. The remote sensor showed 3.7 inches of new snow this morning at the base of Roundhouse. The marketing department reported 6 inches at the top of the mountain. We found some zones this morning skiing boot top deep. That was not enough to eliminate the scratchiness from below, or to protect you from the hazards that were just below the new snow. Still it was really a nice change.

Oh my god! Look at that core shot! – Several skiers and riders today at the base area

I warned you in my last report that this storm would be problematic in that it would not be enough new snow to cover up all of the rocks, trees tops and other hazards that have appeared over the last month. For that reason, I was careful over the last couple of days to ski some areas to preview what might lay beneath the new snow.

For the most part I stuck to those places I had identified as relatively safe. That does not mean that I stuck to just groomed slopes today. On the contrary, reviewing my Slopes data, about 80% of my turns this morning were in off piste zones that are not as heavily travelled. Sometime just before noon, in my quest to find those last bits of untouched powder, I realized that I was traveling more and more in uncharted territory that I have not skied recently. That seemed like a good time to call it a good day.

I know this is frustrating, but this is going to be one of those days where I am not going to share specific details about where we skied today. Only one of those runs is actually on the map. I will say that I completely skipped Summit today. Yes, theoretically there was more snow up top. But powder days draw out powder hounds that tend to schralp everything in sight within 30 minutes. That was only magnified today with no High Traverse, Sherwood, upper TLC, Gentian or the upper bowls to draw away some of that crowd. All of my time was spread pretty evenly between Roundhouse, Scott and Lakeview.

It was a good day, and I walked away having not hit a single rock, stump or branch with my skis or my body. I call that a win.

Looking at this storm, it turned into a cutoff low in the Pacific. Consequently there was not much in the way of a jet stream, nor much of any wind. Because of that we saw much less of an orographic lift affect that brings us deeper snowfall in Tahoe. This storm was an underperformer, as the models showed the potential for 8-18 inches of snow. We saw about 8 inches by the end of the day. Hopefully we don’t see the same with the next few storms. I am a bit nervous about how they keep getting pushed farther out.

Tomorrow we get back to a more regular ski day, the last of the slightly less busy days before the holiday weekend onslaught. That said, it’s Wednesday afternoon and there is still free parking reservations available for Saturday and Sunday at Alpine Meadows. Only Monday is looking more full, probably due to that potentially bigger storm arriving Sunday afternoon.

Although tomorrow will not be a “powder day”, there’s a lot of off piste terrain that will be back in play thanks to the new snow. The afternoon crowd will have continued to pack down that new snow and exposed obstacles that were hidden this morning. The groomed slopes should have a good refresh, having nice wintery snow rather than mixed sugar and cookies.

When Does The Snow Return?

It’s going to be relatively quiet through Saturday in the Sierra. If you keep an eye on the GIF below, you can see how the cutoff low slowly moves through tomorrow, leaving a chance of some wrap around snow showers tomorrow to the Southern Sierra. Friday remains clear and so does Saturday. The next big low moves in Sunday and hangs around all week, with consecutive waves of snow.

Potentially there is a weaker low to the north during the last week of February, but currently too far north for significant Tahoe snow. This reawakening of winter may not be all that long.

The snow amounts still look good. Here’s the GFS ensemble for total snowfall over the next ten days. That’s pretty consistent with previous forecasts, the timing is just later.

Five feet of snow is just what we need to rehab Sherwood, Scott and Lakeview to keep this ski season alive. Whether it is great powder, or dense wind driven snow, I am all for it.

New Stickers Are Ordered

I closed the poll regarding what stickers people would like to see for Unofficial Alpine Meadows. The by far most popular choice was a more traditional design with Alpine Meadows green with white lettering.

The new stickers should arrive within about 10 days. I still need to play around with continuing sales via Square, or switching to the store platform that is offered by the Buy Me A Coffee people. Also…I did a very limited run of pink and green die cuts because some people really wanted those. Also in the works is a vinyl die cut designed for cars…it’s been a minute since we offered those.

See you out there tomorrow. Skiing is fun.