Tahoe Storm Train Still Chuggin’ – 04/03/11
ALL ABOARD THE STORM TRAIN!
Date:
March 22nd – April 3rd, 2011
Location: In and around Kirkwood, California also known as when hell freezes over by looking at this picture…hahahaha
Weather: Cold fluff to slushy shit…
Riders:
Skier666,, S.P.C., Mild.bill, Dhklauer, Supu, mogul5480, and little sixer
666:
Mild.bill….sorry boys, he’s getting married very soon
The little ripper…
Cameraman:
666
POV VIDEO – Tahoe Storm Train Still Chuggin’
Music: FRESH – GATEKEEPER
Synopsis:
The storms dropped another 20 feet or so since my last blog…
The wife and I decided to book a room with the little guy due to the interlodge scenerio the previous weekend’s road closures. I was able to ski the morning pow, ski with the little guy, and then go back out to slay as much as possible. The following weekend, the heat took its toll on the snow. Sun and an inversion created water runnels even at the top of Thunderbowl. The snow was so slow and sticky that it may have been the ‘worst snow ever on skis’, yep, no joke. However, its been about 5 years since we’ve been able to make turns down the slash chute past V-tree in thunderbowl.
Java Porn: Diet Rock Star & some chocolate covered coffee beans
March 20-22nd, 2011:
Look at that storm…it’s a damn hurricane!
Made it a little tough to grab a Peets coffee in the Marina…
But as the clouds lifted, Mild.bill was ready to huck his meat (see pov)
Then S.P.C decided to land in the bombhole..ouch!
S.P.C heads over to Kodak…
March 25-27th 2011:
On the last weekend of March, the family and I decided to drive up to the ‘snow’….as in Placerville at 1800ft….ha
Hwy 50 was between storms…
But sure didn’t lack the BASS near Sierra…
At lake level, the boats were hating life…
At least I didn’t have to mow the grass back there…
The next day on Chair 6….I was lined up for a decent chair.
My first lap was OK….
The second was eh….
Third lap, Oops is almost too filled in at this point….
But some interesting lines popped up…
Then the Wall opened….first time in 10 feet or so…..
Yeah, it was good. Even if I was solo….
The chair was only opened for 3 laps…
I then migrated to Chair 1 to ride with this guy…
He did well for his first storm skiin’ day…
….but he insisted on Chairs 9 & 7, so we slayed those as well.
After a KW Inn dinner, we took a drive up the Spur…
The next morning it looked like this out of my window….
And this…
Supu made a dirty appearance…
He skied some Upper Cham pow…
Dhklauer made an appearance…
Mogul5480 turned where I wasn’t expecting…
Over to Dan’s for pow….
Supu carves out some stress…
666 jumps into that new zone again…
And then over by Olympic….
The Wall opens so I headed down toward Eagle and then cut over to Waterfall…
Waterfall was fun…
And a final run with first tracks down Norm’s…
And then back over near Chair 7 corduroy….
After another Kirkwood Inn meal, it was time to break out the good camera for the Carson Spur shots on the departure back to reality land…
Make sure you honk around this turn…
Weekend ending on April 3rd:
Our ‘groomer started with Upper Cham, where mild.bill got aggressive…
He’s still with us…
At this point, they might as well groom it….
Next up, time to make ‘turns’ down Once is Enough…
I think it measured as a quad black diamond…
I followed with an ‘air turn’…
mild.Bill found a random balloon but I refused to accept it…
Over to Waterfall zone….in craptastic snow.
Its finally time to rock Slash Chute in CHUNDERBOWL…
Its been a while….previous attempts were:
(click pics for TR)
2005:
And…..
2006: Lowest snow conditions attempt for me, even had to air out…ugh
And later in that year….
With a strong inversion, we almost bailed on the line until we saw a safe shitty snow entrance on skiers right…
After some wet slough management over exposure, mild.bill drops into the gut…
OMG its 2011 and a POV still ACTUALLY INSIDE the chute!!!!
Thanks mild.bill for scraping the good snow off….
Alright, its time to regroup and attempt some turns….
Scott Schmidt eat your heart out!
This just proves that snow looks better in pics than they actually ski, so Powder magazine, I’ve got your number…
Yep, a crevasse at Kirkwood…
We survived ‘Grand Master Headband’…..
Slush postholing all the way back up to Palisades was so fun!!!!
Cue Kool in the Gang…
Ugh….dark clounds combined with warmth equals……….
Perfectly timed departure, rain, graupel and a car full of sweaty men all the way back to SF