Permatographer’s Presidential Tahoe Weekend Tour – 02/20/06

Day 1 – Squaw Valley USA International Home of the 1960 Winter Olympics Ski Resort

Mr. Lane Meyer invited us up from the Bay to stay in Truckee on Friday night. With a possible DJ gig at the house, I load up some crucial dnb vinyl and grab Slim to brave the holiday traffic. As most of the NorCal contingency is aware, Friday night was one of the worst commutes in a long while. For us, 6 hours to Truckee, normally 3 hour drive, but when its dumping at Auburn (elevation 1,000 ft) you know its going to be a really fun drive. Hell, even people were skiing in Napa:

http://tetongravity.com/forums/showthread.php?t=47201

Throughout the drive, texts came in strong from Supu, Shugs, and others throughout the night inform us that HWY 88 was closed for the evening due to ice, and HWY 50 closed due to people driving up on their summer slicks. The final text came from Shugs at 5:30 am, stating that he finally arrived in South Lake. That made our 2:30 am arrival into Truckee seem like a heavenly adventure.

After around 3 hours of sleep, we woke up to about a foot and a half of Tahoe’s lightest and driest, cool temps, occasional snow showers, and the occasional bluebird. Most of the steep terrain did have a firm coating of concrete under the blanket of fluff, so it was a day to cruise the pow and have….well….a great time with your intern3t friends. Not many action shots due to the fact that I was following the leader for most of the day.

Players: Slim, Lane Meyer, Basom, Oldtimer, Rob, NZ rider Skea_457, others, and myself.

Music: Konflct – ‘Messiah’

Lane Meyer, Rob, and Oldtimer acting like its cold in sunny California:

The fingers with a fresh coating of ranch dressing:

With Oldtimer acting as the guide, our Squallywood adventure started on KT22 with pow laps near Olympic Lady, which also included actually riding the Oly lift.

We cruised to Headwall in flat-light, and Antarctic temps to hurry back down to the Funitel to warm up and say a quick hello to Huckwheat. Then, over to Broken Arrow to ride some of the classic lines:

Lane Meyer looking for his two dollars….

Slim decides to grab some sierra cement:

Too bad he’s 7 feet tall…

The K12 – Lane skied this on one ski for the last run….but I don’t know why:

Slim in Silverado…

Looker’s right going up Silverado chair…

….and then looker’s left:

We ventured over to Granite Chief for a few runs only to find the Peak closed and Corkscrew shut as well.

Over to Headwall, and we find Squaw’s most handsome skier, Basom. Sorry, no pics….he skis way too fast, or………way too slow….don’t know which.

Needing to eat, drink, give a bluetooth lesson to Basom, and to say hello to some Kiwi Squaw implants, we headed over to Chamois. A couple more laps on Headwall and KT, we then called it a day.

Huge thanks to Lane, Rob, and of course Oldtimer for the tour.

Day 2 – Kirkwood, KaliFornya, United States

While at Squaw the previous day, we heard rumors and received texts by the powder hounds stating the skiing was just plain unbelievable. The storm fizzled out overnight, and only about an inch of new snow was reported. Hoping that the BC gates would read "Access," our day at KW would not disappoint.

Players: Zippy, Jrosen32, Lou, Slim, Arty50, Shugs, buddy of Shugs, and myself.

….and yes, the dogs have been let out…….sorry:

Zippy rides through the white dust in Eagle Bowl:

Zippy…on the spines at the bottom of Eagle:

Zippy near Hells in Thunder Saddle:

Jrosen32 copying his little brother…

Lou gets after it on the lower Cirque:

Arty50….trying to cool off due to the extreme heat from the hot conditions:

Lou screaming in lower Eagle:

Jrosen32 doing some gardening….

Zippy looking tight and doing a mid-air check for base damage….

Lou just can’t get enough…he’s hungry…

For the same thing Arty wants….POWDER!!!!

Up to this point, all the previous pics were shot INBOUNDS, the DAY after THE DAY, on a HOLIDAY WEEKEND.

Now, here’s the permatographer making a rare appearance on the Spur to test stability…at 2:30 pm…..and untouched.

Zippy drops in next….does it even look that good?

Zippy zips by on his 136 mm underfoot Moment skis….

but the lighter than Utah snow, will not even let the massive skis stay afloat…

OK, so back to business….Jrosen32 underneath the first Sentinel:

…and being swallowed by the powder gods:

…But wait….look who’s in the starting gate… L O U!

…and he’s hungry….HUNGRY FOR POWDER!!!!!!!

But the fellow Croat is hungry as well…

Leave some for Slim….Jesus:

No, seriously Arty, maybe Slim wants to ski some fresh…

I give up….

Slim at the 06′ Olympics going for the white medal…

…and he gets it!

Zippy, schralping the middle of the Spur…

Jrosen32 having a good run…

…but Lou thinks his run is better:

Damn, maybe it is…..you decide:

Arty goes for the photoslutting shot across the valley…

…and does a fine job…

Slim wants in on the action…not to be denied:

Jrosen32 lines up a cliff on the bottom of the Spur that we thought was 8 feet….

…it turned out to be more like 20 feet:

Zippy decides to ollie over the ice falls….

…and the Lou angle….

and finally, Permatogapher has a little fun….

I would say that this crowded holiday weekend ski day turned out pretty well, what do you think?

Day 3 – QuirkW0uld, NorCAL, North America – German Snowboard Press Tour

Players: Zippy, Charlie (NZ’s most eligible freeskiing bachelor, two female members of the German snowboarding press, and myself, the tour guide to make sure "everyone has a good time."

The weather consisted of a cool, crisp, bluebird morning with a hint of wind on the ridgetops…about 5 inches new, and the outside temp hit a balmy 0 F enroute to the mountain.

Steven’s Peak off of HWY 88:

Elephant’s back….looking yummy:

Charlie follows my tracks in Eagle Bowl:

…see how light that snow looks…it was soooooooo fast and smooth:

Zippy pulls the double "line of the day" next to Waterfall (directly in the sun)

…he’s committed now….

whatever…..so lame….I don’t even know why I filmed it:

Charlie skiing the blue-ice on lower Eagle…

Zippy trying not to scratch his unique skis….

PLEASE GOD, MAKE THEM OPEN THE GOD DAMN CIRQUE…

German in red getting some fluff in Thunder Saddle…

Permatographer getting the tail end of Zippy on the Hells Ridge:

German in blue getting super nice freshies under the Cirque:

Zippy in lower Sisters…

Schralping it…

I wonder what he’s listening to?

A nice shot of the face behind the wall chair…if we had more time, I would have hiked that thing just to get a photo of one big carve on that face…maybe next time…

German in red on Upper Sisters..

Charlie on a random ridge on Lower Sisters….

Straightlining out…

Kirkwood = so hardcore….

Charlie TRIED to convince the girls he’s not gay…of course, that didn’t work…AGAIN. Top of Palisades looking directly to the West toward Gold Country…

Thunder Bowl – a couple minutes later, we met up with a bloody-nosed border who said he got sloughed off the rock looker’s left of V-tree….if you look closely, you can see that he went big.

For the last run, we decided to take a leisurely walk to the Spur…hell it was good yesterday. The Wall and California Chutes in the background.

A ghostly tree near Martin Point…

Made it to the First Sentinel…the wind created some icy conditions on top of the Spur, so the girls decided to hit the shaded trees skier’s right of Sentinel #1.

Still looks good to me…

As a tour guide, its nice to give your clients the goods….

Charlie and I decide to hit the Spur anyway….a little wind-affected up top:

but buttery goodness the last 2/3 of the way down.

3-2-1 dropping into fresh….

yep…looks fresh…

oh, hell yes….its nice…

super nice….the choke at the end of the Spur is almost filled in. It still has about a 5 foot mandatory air that may freak people out that have a no air policy….just FYI.