California/Nevada 2020-2021 Tahoe Ski Resorts/Conditions/Meetups

[Philpug]

Mt. Rose is doing a helluva job grooming.

 

[ProLeisure]

Skied Alpine from 9:00 AM to 11:00 AM this morning. We had a lot of fun, but by 11:00 AM the lines were getting long so we decided to call it a day. The pics of the lift lines below were taken around 10:00 AM.

Again, kudos to Alpine for enforcing mask wearing. They had an employee out in the lift lines making sure everyone had a mask on and that they were wearing it above their nose. Great to see.

 

[textrovert]

Skied Alpine from 9:00 AM to 11:00 AM this morning. We had a lot of fun, but by 11:00 AM the lines were getting long so we decided to call it a day. The pics of the lift lines below were taken around 10:00 AM.

Did the lines get this get long with all the scheduled chairs running?

 

[ProLeisure]

Did the lines get this get long with all the scheduled chairs running?

With only 3 chairs running at Alpine I knew the lines would get long. The lift lines got considerably longer around 11:00 AM, an hour or so after the pics above were taken, which is when we left. We went back later to meet some neighbor friends for a tailgate beer at 1:30 PM. By 2:00 PM the lift lines were beginning to shrink quite a bit.

It also seemed like a lot of Bay Area folks were headed back today. There was steady traffic heading north on 89 to 80 when we drove back to Alpine in the afternoon.

 

[textrovert]

Squaw was skiing nicely today (in the usual sections). Just there for a couple of hours. First Ventures, Squaw Creek, Far West, Red Dog, Exhibition(mid-unload), and Squaw One. Close to straight-to-chair everywhere except Squaw One, which had a 2min line.

Seems like they are building up and saving the upper-mountain for Christmas holidays.

Top section of Squaw Creek

 

[Paul Lutes]

Sugarbowl was my own private resort today. Well organized and well behaved. My first day of the season was like a Sapphire and Fever-Tree after a hot, sweaty day of digging ditches - makes all the pain and uncertainty just fade away.

Snow conditions met or exceeded expectations, but edges were sacrificed, especially on Lake View.

 

[Plai]

Snow conditions met or exceeded expectations, but edges were sacrificed,

I find myself in the same boat. The structure on my carvers are almost gone. Current plan is @smoothrides on early season carvers, when able to jump on wider skis. Here's hoping for a couple of larger dumps by Xmas.

 

[Dougb]

The OpenSnow reports are not very optimistic about the next couple of weeks

Has anyone skied Northstar yet?

 

[luliski]

Newsom is talking about a "complete lockdown," in purple-tier (most) counties. I don't know what that means, exactly, but it doesn't sound like ski resorts could operate if the counties they are in are "locked down." Placer County, home to Alpine Meadows and Squaw Valley is in the purple tier and has seen Covid hospitalizations skyrocket.

 

[Paul Lutes]

Well, that's just swell

I was pleased with the level of compliance at Sugarbowl today but the "crowd" was such that you really stood out if you didn't. One silly dude did get run off by staff for trying to claim that his bandana was sufficient - he was a general tool, but the staff woman wasn't having it and called him out in front of many other customers, and he tucked his tail and ran. I laughed behind my mask.

 

[skibob]

Well, that's just swell

I was pleased with the level of compliance at Sugarbowl today but the "crowd" was such that you really stood out if you didn't. One silly dude did get run off by staff for trying to claim that his bandana was sufficient - he was a general tool, but the staff woman wasn't having it and called him out in front of many other customers, and he tucked his tail and ran. I laughed behind my mask.

IIRC Sugarbowl is partially in Nevada and partially in Placer county.

 

[John Webb]

IIRC Sugarbowl is partially in Nevada and partially in Placer county.

NO, you may be thinking of Heavenly which is partly in Nevada & partly in CA -El Dorado Co.

Sugarbowl is completely within Placer. Co. Their gondola parking is also in Placer.

 

[luliski]

Nevada County is in the purple tier.

 

[Garcia]

Alpine was good today. Ikon Passholders only. Laps all morning...think I had to wait in a line 2x. Picture is of Roundhouse at 10:30.

 

[Philpug]

Mod Note:

Please keep this thread related to Tahoe Resorts...NOT the possible places people will be traveling FROM. We have deleted posts. Please do NOT repost the posts that were deleted.

 

[ProLeisure]

I skied Alpine today for about 3 hours. I had a lot of fun. No lift lines and the skiing was fun considering the lack of snow. Everyone was wearing masks which was also great to see.

Last week I wrote an email to Boreal asking them why they weren’t enforcing mask wearing and if they weren’t even going to attempt to enforce mask wearing in the lift lines that I’d like my money back for my night pass. They responded yesterday stating that they had implemented a ‘3 Strike Policy’ regarding masks <https://www.rideboreal.com/plan-your-trip/getting-here/what-to-expect?page=3371> and that, “additionally, we are working to hire extra lift operations and Care Team staff members to provide line control and mask encouragement. For the immediate, our management team will be taking this role during peak times throughout the day in our base area, and at our Accelerator and/or Castle Peak chairs.” If Boreal would have done this from day one they would have set a precedent with their guests, but it now seems to me they're scrambling to fix something they shouldn't have had to fix.

I wanted to see if Boreal has taken any steps to improve the situation so this evening my wife and I went to Boreal to take a few runs to watch the sunset and full moon rise, which is always pretty cool to do while you’re skiing. There were no employees in the lift lines enforcing mask wearing, but I’d say only about 10% of the people weren’t wearing a mask, or weren’t wearing one properly. The lift operator was asking people to put their mask on if they weren’t wearing one, but that didn’t happen until they were getting on the lift, which is too little too late. Compared to 30+% of people that weren’t wearing masks in the lift lines last week at Boreal, at least it’s an improvement.

 

[skibob]

NO, you may be thinking of Heavenly which is partly in Nevada & partly in CA -El Dorado Co.

Sugarbowl is completely within Placer. Co. Their gondola parking is also in Placer.

The north shore of Donner Lake is in Nevada County and south shore in Placer. For some reason I thought that dividing line cut to the southwest and divided Sugar Bowl.

 

[jwilli]

I was also at Alpine today. Pretty good for what's open, and you can get some nice bump practice off Roundhouse to mix up the groomer runs.

And with the forecast perhaps a two week shut down isn't the worst thing...

 

[raytseng]

No day tickets this season https://www.sfgate.com/coronavirus/...MlHN-Ia6e2dY4S-72nyGNOMdm-KTSfwlpPmOEg2El7egc

I think SFGate is overly focused on 1 bulletpoint, but not seeing the nuance of it.

Even the intent and goal was under the heading to keep a close and tight control on on mountain capacity, and to limit human exchanges and lines/crowds at the base (see banff sunshine village parking lot line for the opposite). So as long as they stopped window sales, and push people to buy on an App that has a clear capacity and access control and sells out; I think they'd comply with the spirit of the document.

If it's all just about the letter of the law and not the spirit; any resort can just follow the path of the super stupid Vail "Exclusive Passholder access until Dec8"; just come over here and buy your 1day EpicDay "pass" and what they have sold you is a really a "pass" product that a brand new passholder happen to just chose to cash in right today; and NOT a day-of window ticket.

 

[dcs24]

I skied Northstar for the first time this season on Monday. No lines, but also no new terrain open since they opened Comstock last week. The snowpack is marginally skiable off-piste in some areas at the higher elevations, but pretty much everything except shaded north facing has gone through at least one or two thaw/freeze cycles so it's difficult to find soft turns. By this point most folks are just sticking to groomers or using their rock skis on the natural runs that are open.

BTW Kirkwood posted its opening plan on its IG story today, screenshot attached. Only Solitude, TC Express, and Bunny lifts expected to open, which is a bit disappointing. Today's OpenSnow Tahoe report says that strong inversions have come into play and that it's not getting cold enough up on the hills to make snow anymore, and Kirkwood has limited snowmaking capability anyways. Also in my backcountry excursions I've noticed that south of the lake the snowpack falls off considerably -- Waterhouse Peak off Luther Pass was barely skiable last week, with much less coverage at similar altitudes vs Rose and Castle Peak areas. Haven't been all the way down to Carson Pass but I'd wager that one or more of the storms that came through in November must've fizzled out before it got down there.