Skiing at Lake Tahoe

Last week Jon found out that several of his work colleagues had rented a house for the weekend in South Lake Tahoe, near the Heavenly ski resort (that’s its name, I’m not using it adjectivally!) and that they still had a few places free! Well, it was an opportunity we certainly couldn’t pass up on, so on Friday night we set off in the car belonging to James (a colleague of Jon’s), mainly because he had snow chains and we didn’t (the police insist upon this). The journey took about four hours, past the state capital, Sacramento and up into the Sierra Nevada.

The house was huge – it slept about sixteen in total, and there were thirteen of us. Unfortunately, there was no snow when we got there, and we had heard that the snow had been somewhat paltry just recently, so had some concerns. However, there proved to be plenty of snow on the slopes themselves, if rather slushy at the bottom, as it was raining heavily there (this turned to sleet, then snow higher up). On Sunday, we woke to find the whole area, including around the house, blanketed in white, and there was lots of fresh powder on the slopes. The precipitation continued in the afternoon, which meant that conditions at the top were basically blizzard with poor visibility. In fact, the difference in conditions between the bottom (about 6,500 feet above sea level) and the top (just over 10,000) was incredibly striking. Unfortunately, we didn’t, therefore, have the great views of the lake (incidentally, the second deepest in the US and tenth in the world) from the summit for which Heavenly is famed, although, to be fair, they were pretty fabulous from the top of the first lift.

The Heavenly ski area straddles the stateline between California and Nevada, so on the first day we skiied across it. It has a wide variety of very attractive runs, including lots of long, fairly easy ones, which I stuck to. Didn’t fall over a lot, although I think I’m suffering from mild whiplash after a tumble yesterday. It is expensive, though, like most resorts in North America, so I think we will get a season lift pass next year and consider buying some of our own equipment – we may even try to get a late season pass this year, as apparently they cut the prices later on.
After a day’s skiing, what could be better than a dip in the hot tub at our rented house? Lovely and warm, even though we were sitting in a torrential downpour! We ate in and stayed up quite late (several of our companions were younger than us and hardened party-animals!), playing games, including Wii sports. I won’t try to explain what this is to those of you who don’t know, but to those of you who do and haven’t tried it, it’s amazing! We left just after 4 pm yesterday and enjoyed the attractive drive through the mountains until it got dark. What a fantastic weekend!