Conditions Report
Yesterday, I drove over 9,945′ Tioga Pass with plans to ski Ellery Bowl just on the East side of the pass. I was hoping for snow down to the parking area like last Spring, but was severely disappointed.
Looking up from the bottom revealed not much snow on the lower half of Ellery Bowl. It looks like neither Chute Out nor Poop Chute quite go all the way right now. The corniced bowl at the top of Ellery Bowl goes but is definitely rocky.
False White looks bony. Maybe skiable if you’re into dodging rocks constantly.
The Power Plant Chutes are in, but there would be a lot of rock walking to access them.
I couldn’t quite see into the Third Pillar but it looked very thin and it’d be a ton of rock walking to get in and out.
Cocaine Chute has decent coverage but again, you’d be walking like crazy to get out. The rest of the chutes don’t look great.
I sat in my car for a long while contemplating. It was 3pm, the snow was rock hard, it was about 40ºF outside and windy. Eventually I decided to pass on skiing Ellery Bowl and I headed straight to the Lazy River in Mammoth. Bit of a bummer because I didn’t earn a Mono Cone but the Lazy River was about 103ºF and perfect.
PHOTO TOUR:
Bummer 🙁 But glad to know you had enough decency not to treat yourself to a Mono Cone even when nobody was watching.