Kirkwood, CA 3/28-29/22

[tseeb]

Skied Kirkwood from 9-3. I would have gone a little later, but lifts closed for lightning and I shuttled back to my SUV. Predictions 8 days

out were for over 20”, but Kirkwood only got an inch and it was dust on crust and hard to avoid firm sub-surface. I rode and skied Timber Creek and Cornice twice early - my tracks are the best ones in this picture from Timber Creek chair

before moving to The Reut that I may have rode and skied 12x. Snow was better than yesterday (at Northstar), but if not on very smooth sub-surface, I found I had to reduce my speed to avoid getting bounced around. I rode a lot of my Reut runs (and one Wall and three Sunrises) with Steve from Los Gatos mountains. He liked main groomer, Conestoga, while my preference was Buckboard, but we tried a lot of other runs searching for smooth untracked 1”.

We moved to Backside, which had been on windhold, about noon. There were places where wind had piled 3-5”, but also places where wind had stripped snow leaving very firm surface. We took three runs before Steve left for where we both parked at Timber Creek after a Reut run about 1 pm when it started snowing hard. I went into 7800 for a $3 Modelo and was offered (and accepted as it’s one of my

favorites) a slice of German Chocolate cake from group celebrating birthday. When I went out it was partially sunny, snowing and had

warmed up enough that subsurface had softened. I started with Reut (this picture is Shotgun at 2. It was not smooth enough earlier)

and then skied two Wall laps and was going to head to my SUV via Cornice and Sentinel, but all lifts went on lightning hold about 3 so I took shuttle back to my SUV and did not wait to see if lifts re-opened. Between EpicMix and my watch, I counted almost 22K. Wall at 2:15

I went back to lakefront hot tub on way from Kirkwood to cabin. I’m thinking about going to Mammoth early on Tues. as they reported 4-5” at opening on Mon and it probably snowed all day and they did not open top.

 

[tseeb]

Updates from Kirkwood Conditions on Twitter from Monday:

3:13 All chairlifts off lightning HOLD; chair 4 closed for the day

3:05 Lightning HOLD all chairs (seemed to have started earlier than that as my last Wall ride started at 2:28 which was 20 minutes after previous ride and all lifts were closed at 2:47 when I went past Solitude)

11:25 Chairs 2, 3 and 4 now OPEN

9:38 Chairs 2, 3 and 4 off wind HOLD. but remain on operational HOLD (staffing?)

 

[tseeb]

Kirkwood 3/29/22

I was almost out the door going to Stagecoach at Heavenly when I saw post on SkiTalk about 7” new at Kirkwood (vs. 3” at Heavenly) that came 15 min ahead of Vail's daily conditions email. I was early enough to go to Kirkwood, arriving there not much after 8:30. I had chain control over Luther Pass, but they were turning sign around in Hope Valley so no chain control rest of the way on CA-88. It was my best day of the year and I was in LCC ealier this month just after they had 10" and while 27" fell. I had more unttracked at Kirkwood today than in 3 UT powder days. Local knowledge goes a long way.

Cornice was skied out fast so my one AM ride, I went down ridge into Corner Chute where steepness had me hitting bottom a lot. Then I had four great laps on Wall chair, sometimes hitting bottom, but it was not affecting my skiing. Then I waited 5-10 minutes at chair 2 for it to open and had four great laps on Backside where I was about 20th chair on Sunrise. I exited towards Thunder Saddle which was mostly roped off for Freeride comp, but I went right towards Corner Chute there and had some of my deepest barely tracked snow. New snow deteriorated quickly from early wind and mid-day sun. After quick break at 7800 to eat my sandwich in sun outside with one of their $3 Modelos, I walked to and rode Reut where I found some untracked on edge of Race Course, then did two more Wall laps (Notch Chute and maybe Heart Chute in Wagon Wheel Bowl) and two gravity traverses (with about 5 steps-up) into Palisades, my first time out there this season. It was getting manky, but was still 7" untracked and I can ski untracked mank.

I quit at 3 with over 20K, I estimate 14K in powder as some runs were 90% and all runs were at least 50%. On way to So. Tahoe, I detoured to Gardnerville to fill-up with $4.75/gallon gas (over $1 less than Tahoe) as my fuel light was on and I'm planning to meet friend at Kirkwood tomorrow and need to make quick trip home on Sat in early PM.

This is my first run into Corner Chute reached by going left at top of Cornice and skiing/hiking out ridge

Skiers right of All The Way, the first chute from the Wall going into Wagon Wheel Bowl, that I found earlier in year when trying to avoid narrow choke in chute.

Above traverse that is to left when getting off The Reut. I had similar area above this that held more turns.

First skier on Backside. Snow here not that deep due to wind-packing and sun settling it, but skied well.

I went right of Thunder Saddle as left was closed for Extreme event and One and Two Man Chutes skied out.

Snow on table outside 7800 does not look like 7", but bench looks like at least 6.

View from lunch at 7800. Corner Chute where I had my first powder run of day is the long one to right (left of thick trees) underneath False Peak.

I was going to finish with a run down skied-out Sentinel, but instead went further out into Palisades than previous run and found this at almost 3 PM.

 

[Sbooker]

No signature shot of the lake?

 

[Tony Crocker]

Caples Lake? Kirkwood is a 45 minute drive from South Lake Tahoe over two mountain passes.