Tahoe Backcountry Breakdown: Christmas Chowder

The skiing in Tahoe has been pretty sweet lately, and more terrain has been opening up with each storm. Conditions have varied over the last few weeks, but if you know where to look the skiing can be quite good.

Prior to the Christmas storm the conditions were pretty firm thanks to a bulletproof raincrust that reached upwards of 9000 feet in spots. Before the rain hit, however, the skiing was unreal. Every day was a powder day for two weeks or so, until the notorious Tahoe rains snuffed out the fun.

The Christmas Eve storm, that was supposed to drop a foot of blower, ended up being a bust and only left the Tahoe area with around 6 inches of snow. This storm also delivered some strong north to northeast winds, which created windslab problems in pretty unusual spots. In typical Tahoe fashion these small slabs stabilized within a day or two and provided us with nice wind-fueled powder turns on southern aspects.

Cold temperatures are here to stay for a while, which should keep the snow nice until the next storm. As of now it’s looking like the next significant storm won’t be until after January 5^th, but the long range forecast models are suggesting that January should be epic. Hopefully the outlook doesn’t change and we’re back to skiing blower pow on all aspects here in Tahoe. For now, keep those sacrifices to Ullr coming.