tseeb
Well-known member
Another great day on the South end of Tahoe. Friend from FL had an extra parking pass for where he stays across from gondola and I got his cousin a Buddy pass, then after short line we loaded gondola about 9. (Didn't realize Heavenly is open at 830 all President's week). I thought I saw early that Heavenly reported 6" new vs. 4 at Kirkwood, but after skiing saw that was Tuesday's number and Wednesday was 1" which I had on my car overnight. But Heavenly had 16” new on Monday and there is a lot less competition for it than at Kirkwood.
We rode Tamarack and I skied some powder and found more bumps than expected in Big Dipper Bowl. We then rode Dipper and went into Milky Way Bowl, which is one of all of our favorites. They traversed to ropeline while I made some turns into steep line next to bowl before cutting over to find them. Even though it was before usual 10 AM opening, patrol was taking down rope into Mott Canyon gate 3 so I skied it twice early before riding Dipper and going into Stateline Chute using Killibrew Gate B after skiing along ropeline, my first time down that chute this year.
https://www.skiing-blog.com/heavenly-an-inside-guide/ for Stateline says "Boasting a 1,000 foot vertical drop, this 40-degree, north-facing avalanche path is the best place to find soft, chaulky snow after a storm." After skiing more steep and deep, more open, lightly tracked, I caught higher exit to Mott chair. Purple arrow is Pipeline. Most of Stateline (green arrow) is hidden.
Hill on left is Boundary Chutes and some of The Meadows, but skiing there makes it hard to get higher exit to Mott chair.
I re-connected with friends and we skied Milky Way Bowl again then Nevada Trail and went up North Bowl and Olympic and skied The Pines where I found a lot of short untracked. Next time up Olympic we skied to and had lunch outside Tamarack Lodge. It was sunny at first, then clouded up and started snowing, then after friends added heatpacks to their gloves the sun came back out. They announced over loud PA a couple of times for people to give up their tables after 30 minutes and it was incredibly crowded when I went inside to refill my water (and found a short line there). We rode Tamarack and skied CA Trail and passed up Maggie’s Canyon as we would have been late for meeting with friend who has moved to Minden and his sister, who I had not seen for many years. We eventually connected and skied a few runs from Canyon lift with them. We also skied Waterfall once with me finding more powder to ski along left side and in trees further left. After returning to and taking a couple of NV runs with Minden friend, I avoided downloading the gondola by skiing Firebreak, over 3K vertical side-country run that had enough untracked that I may need to take out my powder skis out and ski it again tomorrow. Lakeview shortly after gated entry posted "You Can Die" and ski with a partner and beacon. I survived but not a great idea to ski it alone so late in day.
May have been patrol who hiked up to communication towers on top of East Peak and left these tracks.
Some photos taken coming down Firebreak.
My tracks are the ones with turns in last photo. Lower down there was some bushwacking, a big log that I threw my skis off before sliding down it,
a couple of snowbridges over running creeks and some thin spots before I skied down hiking trail that got me close to gondola base. It was 420 before I took my skis off next to Lake Parkway after a more than 30 minute run.
My watch counted 25.5K. New friend who I let use one of my $131 Buddy passes (walkup $239, Northstar $269) bought me a Happy Hour beer at Libation Lounge that is short walk from where they stay. I went to Safeway and encountered my longest line of the day since I couldn’t use self-check as I was buying this 12-pack (less than cost of 4-pack at brewpub which also had long line).
We rode Tamarack and I skied some powder and found more bumps than expected in Big Dipper Bowl. We then rode Dipper and went into Milky Way Bowl, which is one of all of our favorites. They traversed to ropeline while I made some turns into steep line next to bowl before cutting over to find them. Even though it was before usual 10 AM opening, patrol was taking down rope into Mott Canyon gate 3 so I skied it twice early before riding Dipper and going into Stateline Chute using Killibrew Gate B after skiing along ropeline, my first time down that chute this year.
Hill on left is Boundary Chutes and some of The Meadows, but skiing there makes it hard to get higher exit to Mott chair.
I re-connected with friends and we skied Milky Way Bowl again then Nevada Trail and went up North Bowl and Olympic and skied The Pines where I found a lot of short untracked. Next time up Olympic we skied to and had lunch outside Tamarack Lodge. It was sunny at first, then clouded up and started snowing, then after friends added heatpacks to their gloves the sun came back out. They announced over loud PA a couple of times for people to give up their tables after 30 minutes and it was incredibly crowded when I went inside to refill my water (and found a short line there). We rode Tamarack and skied CA Trail and passed up Maggie’s Canyon as we would have been late for meeting with friend who has moved to Minden and his sister, who I had not seen for many years. We eventually connected and skied a few runs from Canyon lift with them. We also skied Waterfall once with me finding more powder to ski along left side and in trees further left. After returning to and taking a couple of NV runs with Minden friend, I avoided downloading the gondola by skiing Firebreak, over 3K vertical side-country run that had enough untracked that I may need to take out my powder skis out and ski it again tomorrow. Lakeview shortly after gated entry posted "You Can Die" and ski with a partner and beacon. I survived but not a great idea to ski it alone so late in day.
May have been patrol who hiked up to communication towers on top of East Peak and left these tracks.
Some photos taken coming down Firebreak.
My tracks are the ones with turns in last photo. Lower down there was some bushwacking, a big log that I threw my skis off before sliding down it,
My watch counted 25.5K. New friend who I let use one of my $131 Buddy passes (walkup $239, Northstar $269) bought me a Happy Hour beer at Libation Lounge that is short walk from where they stay. I went to Safeway and encountered my longest line of the day since I couldn’t use self-check as I was buying this 12-pack (less than cost of 4-pack at brewpub which also had long line).
