Dec 13th: Hunting for Post-Storm Pow at Palisades

“Colorado powder with California weather.”

This blog post was written by Rene Jerez

I arrived at Palisades at about 8:45 am and the conditions were absolutely phenomenal with no wind, temperatures in the 25s to 30s, and soft sunlight. The air was crisp and it wasn’t cold or freezing at all with the lack of wind. There was plenty of pow still left over the second day after this weekend’s epic storm that dropped almost 60 inches of fresh snow all over the mountain.

With the series of La Nina winters these past few years it’s awesome to see the Tahoe area getting slammed like it used to in the past! A skier I talked to on the Funitel ride up to upper mountain put it best when he described today’s conditions as “Colorado powder with California weather.” These conditions should hold up for the rest of the week and the snow should hold up well.

This morning’s view from the Funitel

Once getting up to the top of the Funitel I decided to kick my day off by riding down Siberia Bowl, as I figured that would be a great place for the powder to have accumulated over the weekend. I was right on the mark, as I found stash after stash of freshies ripe for the picking. The powder was so soft and deep, and I was finding it to be a good challenge to get my powder legs back. Even though the pow was already being cut up by eager skiers and boarders there were still plenty of fresh patches to find, with no ice anywhere. It felt so awesome to shred down ungroomed powder, even if it was pretty easy to get stuck in and dig my way out back to the trail.

After doing repeated laps down, alternating between Siberia Bowl, Ridge Run (Ridge Run was perfect today for fast snowboarding!), and Killy’s I decided to head over to do some tree runs at the Shirley Lake Chair which was full of ungroomed goodness. As a snowboarder, I love hitting ungroomed terrain full of bumps and uneven terrain, and the baby moguls that were forming on Shirley Bowl, Tomlinson’s 1st, and Hills 2nd were especially great practice for me. The snow around this area was firmer and more compacted than around Siberia Bowl and it was so great to zoom down. I ended up lapping this area for a considerable amount of time and did some runs down Gold Coast Express, which was also full of powdery goodness.

Today’s lake views were out of this world!

After lunch, for my afternoon session, I decided I was ready to rock on KT-22 and got my first turns of the season there with hot laps down Saddle and Saddle Face. Saddle was especially amazing today, and that was the trail I managed to hit my fastest times for the day. By this time the clouds were coming in low to the resort, with the tallest points of the resort peeping out from under the cloud cover. I’m glad I wore my cloudy day goggles as they came in handy coming down through the various cloud layers. This season I definitely want to explore more of the harder and more famous terrain that the Mothership offers.

Soaring through the clouds riding the Mothership

After I felt my fix for KT-22 was satisfied, I decided to wrap my day up with more hot laps but this time shredding down Olympic Valley’s famed Mountain Run and Sunnyside trails. I find Mountain Run and its connected trails to be the perfect environment to work on my riding, and like everywhere else today it was completely free of ice patches.

Today was great to kick off my season and I’m extremely grateful for today’s conditions. The stoke for me in regards to looking forward to the rest of this season is off the charts. Here’s to an awesome rest of the season!

Looking down on Olympic Valley