Squaw Valley, CA 4/29/19

tseeb

Well-known member
Starting 4/29, Squaw is your only choice around Tahoe if you want to ski during the week. Alpine, was Summit only last weekend, and Heavenly, where I rode and skied 7 lifts on Sunday which was last day for Stagecoach base, are weekends only through Memorial Day. Squaw is scheduled to run KT through Mother’s Day and moved up their hours to 8-2 starting Monday, except KT where W-facing takes time to soften and will stay open to 4 pm. All other Tahoe resorts are now closed, except for Donner Ski Ranch whose website says "OPEN SATURDAYS AND SUNDAYS… ‘TIL THE SNOW IS GONE!"

I left So Tahoe about 7 and I arrived shortly before 8 and booted up in Dave’s Deli where a few pugski Squaw regulars eventually arrived. It was 8:30 when I went up Funitel with Jim/4ster who spends his winters at Snowbasin and summers at South Tahoe. I’ve mountain biked at Tahoe with him, but never skied with him and would not this day as he went down Mountain Run to meet late arriving friends and I went to Gold Coast which I rode three times. Snow was still a little firm, but the three groomers I skied were all carveable.

I rode Gold Coast once more and skied to Shirley Lake and went past the Race Course where rumors said Mikaela Shiffrin had already left for Mammoth. I only found a one groomer wide track that was fun, but I went too low, almost to base of (not running for weeks) Solitude lift and had to traverse and step up a steep firm slope and then climb a little to get to Shirley base. I rode Granite Chief, but E-facing runs seems too firm at top so I traversed to the Main Emigrant Backside run that was getting more sun and was soft, but irregularly groomed. I rode Shirley, then Siberia and took higher Reverse Traverse than was fast and firm and ended with a nasty drop onto road that I survived. S-facing Sun Bowl was excellent corn about 10 AM. I mostly skied firm, easiest route groomer to get back to Mountain Run although steep E-facing face at end was soft enough to ski the ungroomed. I next did a KT lap skiing E-face which was in very good shape all the way to the base of Olympic Lady. Julia’s Gold was way too firm and bumped out so I found better route towards KT chair that started firm, but quickly softened, especially where it flattened out.

At the bottom I found Tom/near_nyquist and Alfred/unpiste who both live near me and ski Squaw a lot. We rode the Funitel and Big Blue and skied SE/S-facing Tower 16 which was a little past it’s prime, both for the day and season. We repeated same lifts and skied Shirley to Granite Chief where I followed them on two laps; first was E-facing mostly under chair and a little too soft, and second was steep and a lot farther lookers left, almost to Shirley, and N/NE-facing and much firmer but soft enough. I left them and saw Mikaela Shiffrin, who I had seen near base of Shirley earlier, loading chair. I knew it was her because I had a 1-on-1 ride with her Mom. Her Mom said there was no reason to go to CO this Spring as snow is better in CA and that they would so be relocating to Mammoth where Mikaela was going to do speed training, which sounds like it would be fun to watch.

I needed to be back in San Jose for a 7 PM class and my wife wanted me home to give her a ride to it and I knew if I stayed too late I would have traffic getting through Milpitas and San Jose so I decided to do a top-to-bottom run from Siberia, then a KT lap and get on road not much after noon. But Siberia stopped for at least 15 minutes. It was long enough that two different patrollers skied the liftline telling everyone stoppage was because they had to remove an injury. It seems like someone must have gotten hurt on one of the twin Zipperlines under the steep top of the lift and they did not want chair running during the removal. That cost me my KT lap as it was 12:20 when I got to the base and about 12:40 when I got on the road home. I did get what they said was a half-price voucher from patrol at top of Siberia, but since I have Ikon pass and it says “Please present along with Today’s Lift Ticket or Season Pass at the Season Pass Office”, I’m not sure it will do me any good. My watch had almost 17.5K and SkiTracks said, 16,666 vertical. No pictures and traffic was not as bad as I expected/usual getting home so my drive was quick at 3 1/2 hours.
 
The weather disturbance was even farther south than predicted. Supposedly it was sunny at Mammoth Monday. On the drive home Sunday it got cloudy below Lone Pine. We had thick clouds with overnight mist/drizzle both Monday and Tuesday mornings in SoCal.
 
Was trying to connect with tseeb on Siberia but found he did reverse Traverse & Sun Bowl which takes you to the bottom since
Headwall lift is done for the year. Wanted to stay topside to meet others (mostly unsuccessful). Tom & unpiste were traveling
to fast to catch as my skis were in bad need of waxing. Found the race course and think Mikaela Shiffrin had just run it but saw only one of her teammates. Chute 75 had gigantic moguls. Then heard from tseeb again while he was on the stopped Siberia lift for 15 minutes.
 
Thanks for the report.
tseeb":10c0lpn3 said:
It seems like someone must have gotten hurt on one of the twin Zipperlines under the steep top of the lift and they did not want chair running during the removal.
You're describing a zipline which anybody can do. A zipperline is a primo mogul run ridden at speed, which nobody on here but me can do...
 
Back
Top