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Saturday, February 4, 2012 |
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Heavenly and Kirkwood 4/05
Apr 28, 2005 - 2:26 PM By GadgetRick
Anyway, my wife and I skied Heavenly and Kirkwood while we were out there. Had a blast skiing and doing many of the other things which are available for doing out there. It's an awesome place. We skied Heavenly one day while we were there. Everything you may have heard about Heavenly is true. It's not a challenging mountain (although there are supposedly a few harder trails--some weren't open and my wife wasn't into doing the others. It is a cruiser mountain for sure. Not much to challenge you. However, you HAVE to ski Heavenly because, as you may have heard, it boasts some of the best views of Lake Tahoe from any ski resort in the area. And, let me tell you, those are not idle boasts! The views are AMAZING from Heavenly! Nice wide open trails with Lake Tahoe in the background. Can't get much better than that! Heavenly is a large mountain and borders Nevada and California. So you can ski from one California to Nevada and back. It's interesting to note the change in terrain from one side to the next. You wouldn't think it would change that much but it's a fairly large change. I actually bumped into someone with a Hunter Mountain shirt on. He was out with his family from NY. It's a small world... There are so many places to ski within an hour and a half it's tough to decide where to ski. We decided to ski Kirkwood next since I'd heard a lot of good things from them and a lift ticket was good for two consecutive days. So we headed out there for a couple of days of skiing next. The first thing which makes it worth going out there from Tahoe is the drive out. Talk about amazing views all the way out! Wow!!! Lots of backcountry skiing and snowmobiliing throughout the area. It's one big winter party out there! Anyway, Kirkwood is sort of situated in the middle of nowhere (about an hour from South Lake Tahoe--where we stayed). If you've ever been to Arapahoe Basin in Colorado, Kirkwood reminded me of that a little. Same type of terrain (more challenging) and similar setup on the mountain. Well, the first day we skied it snowed off and on throughout the day. They'd picked up about 4 inches the day before so there was a little pow pow to play in. It's fairly steep from the top but it's (barely) above treeline so you have a lot of room to play. Most of the mountain is more challenging. There's not as much beginner/intermediate skiing there as many other mountains but they had so much nice snow it wouldn't matter as much to an intermediate skier. I had my wife (an intermediate skier) going off the top of the mountain without a problem. The conditions were excellent. You have to go to the top just for the views alone. You don't see the lake from there but you do see some spectacular views of the mountains. I'll have to post some pics whene I get them ready. Anyway, the skiing was excellent there. Kirkwood is an awesome mountain and there are many more to choose from. I was told Kirkwood, typically, gets the most snow every year. I was reading their report for one of the days we were there and I noticed, depending on where you measure on the mountain, they've recieved anywhere from 650 inches to 800 inches of snow this season! Oh, they were also expecting more snow this week! If I hadn't seen the amount of snow there I wouldn't be able to comprehend that amount of snow! It's just amazing the amount they get there. In fact, on one of our drives into the middle of nowhere to check things out, we noticed many houses which were actually COVERED in snow! One bar (closed for the season) had a motorhome parked next to it. You know, like one of those large motorhomes? Anyway, the only part sticking out of the snow was about a foot of the top of it! We couldn't get a pic of it but it's mindboggling to see that much snow. I took a pic of my wife standing next to where they had cut the snow for a street (can't plow that amount) and the snow beside her is about 12 feet high! Amazing... Oh well, I'll stop talking about the amount of snow they have and just say, go to Lake Tahoe for some skiing. It's some great skiing and you really can't beat the views.
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