Interesting development - the future of Homewood is a private resort for local homeowners? I have only been to Homewood 2x, but it can be a very good storm mountain. Likely has the best views of Tahoe. Over the past decade, skier visits to Homewood have dropped 40% and season passholder sales have fallen from 2,800 in 2012 to 1,800 this winter, a 64% decline. According to Chapman, the large majority of current passholders are West Shore residents. He attributes these slumping numbers... Read more ..read more

I don't normally do many trip reports, but got some time tonight and thought what the hey. I had 2 day passes left to use, and have been trying to get over here from ID for the last month... but the stars never aligned. I had a cold this past week, but was feeling better Tuesday, so wife told me to go for it, so I drove the 6 hrs to Bend and used points and stayed at the Towneplace Marriott on the SW part of Bend. The weather had been fairly typical spring-like the last few days... Mostly... Read more ..read more

After spending just a night in Rossland, we moved over to Nelson for 2 nights to ski at Valhalla Powdercats. This cat operation has some very steep terrain - and typically runs just 2 cats - compared to the 3-4 that can be in operation at Big Red. This is definitely not the operation for first-time cat skiers. Logistics for Valhalla are a bit of a pain in the ass. The base operations/check-in facility is already off the main highway down a bit of a sketchy road. After checking everyone... Read more ..read more

Patrick and I drove separately to Mammoth because he was moving on to Tahoe. This made sense because he'll ski Alpine Meadows May 24-25 and then some of Palisades' final weekend. He should return to Mammoth by Memorial Day itself as that will be the last day chairs 9 and 14 will run and he has never been there when they were open. The delayed Cruel World music finale meant this Mammoth trip was a one night stand for me. Liz has her knee surgery early this morning and was home by 1PM... Read more ..read more

Tony Crocker said: So obviously we will be here today and Patrick and I will drive to Mammoth tomorrow. I will just ski Tuesday while he will continue on to Tahoe, where he will get to ski Alpine Meadows and KT-22 for the first time Click to expand... Guess it is time to put that IKON Pass to use! Although both Mammoth and Palisades will have lift tickets around $80-100 for multi-days over Memorial Day Weekend. Just hope thunderstorms do not ruin it all. And lots are forecasted. Too bad... Read more ..read more

2023: I was invited to a ground breaking ceremony last week for a new 18mo build of a new lodge in the beginner area that has/will replace the junky old trailers that have been down there for decades. It will have some level of food service, a deck facing the slopes, and will be the home of ski school and the non-profit Ignite disabled programs (with 5K sq ft of space just for them). Ground was actually broken first of May-ish and huge work required to move all sorts of base area utilities... Read more ..read more

I had some meetings in Los Angeles for the upcoming week so I decided to lug my skis to SoCal to ski one last time at Mt. Baldy on Easter Sunday (not the most popular choice). Wanted to try spring skiing at Baldy vs. the mid-winter conditions I had 2 weeks earlier. Looks like Tony was here a couple of days before me. Not sure if it froze the night before, but things seemed to soften like during a normal corn cycle. I was... Read more ..read more

I was always interested in Southern California ski resorts, mountain ranges, and Big Bear Lake - but could never justify a trip there. However, with a once-a-generation winter snowfall, it was now or never. I will just provide a summary of my experiences and thoughts on the areas since locals really do not need full-fledged reports. Mountain High Both sides of Mountain High open (East and West) were open on Friday... Read more ..read more

Wednesday (corrected) 5/10 @Tony Crocker gave me another great Spring tour of Mammoth although conditions were not what he expected in a few places. Our first time down Dave's, snow turned very abruptly from never been melted Winter to soft Spring. Dropout Chute skied well although flatter area at bottom needed to be skied more and smoothed out while Wipeout was great in most places but had been scraped down to very firm and shiny old layer in some places. Gravy Chute is so filled in... Read more ..read more

Friday and Saturday were warmer (upper 40’s F) with no wind and a lighter overnight freeze, so softening was about an hour earlier than Thursday. This is not as warm as it can be mid-spring and it’s important to have some overnight freeze for an optimal corn window. The unloading area of chair 2 was soft at 8:30 opening bell Friday while it was firm until about 9:15 Thursday. So we adjusted our schedule accordingly from Thursday. We hit Coyote not much after 9AM. Ralphie’s and Fascination... Read more ..read more