Northstar-at-Tahoe
Saturday 2 March 1991
Weather
Snowing, hard.
Conditions
Lots of fresh powder snow following a major storm. Still snowing throughout the day which made visibility very poor.
The Story of the Day
This turned out to be a major adventure.
Skied with Geoff Morris and Ruth Lambert (no relation).
The X/Open management team were in conference in the Napa valley and several of us planned to drive up to Lake Tahoe. It was raining solidly in the valley and this turned to heavy snow on the interstate across Donner Summit. What should have been a four hour journey took close to eight hours. Although we had a four wheel drive car, traffic was held up at the chain control and very slow over the summit.
It was still snowing on Saturday morning and we chose Northstar because none of the lifts were on wind-hold. Some of the runs were groomed, but elsewhere there was thigh deep powder. Visibility ranged from poor at the start of the day to almost impossible later.
The first couple of runs down Main Street and then the West Ridge were OK. There were some falls as we hit unexpected dips but the snow was soft and forgiving.
The trouble came when we headed down the East Ridge in the other direction. Quickly the groomed area gave out and we found ourselves trying to ski across powder which none of us really knew how to handle. The single descent took about 45 minutes as we fell repeatedly and had to search for skis, poles and then try to get back onto the skis.
Thereafter is was back to the West Ridge and Luggi's for the rest of the day. By about mid-afternoon, visibility was virtually nil so we gave up.
(The following day was even worse. When we got to Northstar it was raining heavily at the village level, so we did not even try to ski.)
Runs
Last updated:
18/11/03