Snow In California
Friday, December 19th, 2008
Several big storms have dropped lots of snow on ski resorts in California, the last major world ski region to be “running late” with snow deliveries from mother nature this winter.
Heavenly Mountain Resort, the leading ski area on Lake Tahoe, reported 22 inches of new snow in the last 48 hours from the first Tahoe-area major storm and is bracing for another series of Tahoe-style winter storms. The mountain already boasts the best snow surface conditions and most open acreage of Lake Tahoe’s dozen or so ski areas.
At Squaw Valley to the north the resort has expanded operations and terrain since over two feet of fresh snow brought snow depths up to 40 inches (a metre), with top-to-bottom skiing and snowboarding and up to nine lifts currently in operation.
Most of the rest of the world’s ski areas have good snow coverage already with most major resorts in the Alps, Dolomites and Pyrenees in Europe boasting healthy snow base depths of 2 – 3 metres.
In North America most areas have average or above average cover including the Colorado Rockies , New England, Alberta and Quebec. Inland ski areas in British Columbia have good cover but conditions are more challenging near to the Pacific coast.
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