Wondering what things look like in the Whitney region? How about a few Aerial Shots by a USMC pilot? Spectacular!

I figured the storms were about finished yesterday, with widely scattered showers here at home that seemed to be petering out as the day went by. Then last night I was awoken by the sound of heavy rain that didn’t seem to quit untill morning.

In case you’re wondering what happened in the local mountains, Mountain High reports 12-20″ of snow overnight, and Mount Baldy reports 18″ of new snow on top of yesterday’s 6-12″ wet dump. Again, lots of warnings about weather, road restrictions, lift delays, closures, etc. And please — stay out of the backcountry today!

But still…Wow.

Judging by the massive crowds heading up Mount Baldy Road yesterday, I suppose it’s no secret when it snows that Southern California’s best skiing happens at a quirky little ‘resort’ called the Mount Baldy Ski Area.

With little to no snowmaking, vintage lifts (translation: ancient and unreliable), and at best variable conditions, Mount Baldy is not for the faint of heart.

Put four feet of snow on the mountain, however, and things improve markedly.

Covered in snow, Mount Baldy’s terrain is steep and varied enough to satisfy most anyone. Add in the excellent sidecountry options, and Baldy Ski rises to an inarguable gem, made all the sweeter by its preposterous proximity (60 miles?) to downtown Los Angeles. I was up and skiing yesterday. As usual, the hoped-for light powder had already congealed into a chunky windpack, but there were still sweet turns to be had—especially once Baldy’s south bowl opened up.

I did take a peek at several sidecountry spots, including the Butch Wash chutes (will post more later). Conditions appear to be rapidly stabilizing, but many of these locations are either wind-scoured and bare, or bulletproof.

Well, they say cut-off lows are the forecaster’s nightmare, and it’s easy to see why, as last night’s forecast of occasional showers turned instead into a gutter-busting sustained heavy downpour. Rainfall totals and forecasts have jumped overnight. They’re now calling for 2-3 inches of coastal-area rain and 4-6 inches of foothill-area rain today before the big storm hits.

The tragic part of the forecast calls for the cutoff low to delay the arrival of the main storm, allowing it to pick up subtropical moisture (the dreaded pineapple express). This will push the rainfall totals up even higher, but it will also push up the snow level, from a current 5000′ to 8000′ or higher, destroying all that precious white stuff that’s been laid down at the lower elevations. That won’t impact the higher backcountry elevations, but it will nuke most of the local ski areas’ snowpacks.

If you can get there, Mt. Baldy Ski Area looks like the way to go today (though expect delays/a late start as they work to dig themselves out).

Somewhere around 7 p.m. yesterday, after four hours of steady rain, this storm began to turn me into a believer—right before the skies cleared.

Still, this was a nice punch of moisture, with (much?) more on the way. Mt. Baldy reports 12-14″ of new snow, Mountain High 10-18″, and Mammoth 5″ new with a 15″ storm total. Not too shabby for the SoCal resorts! Elsewhere, heavy rain caused the usual problems in the basin, Santa Barbara set a 24-hour rain record, and for motorists on I-5, the Grapevine became a snowy hell.

Thanks to very cool temps, backcountry lines could be skiable much lower than we’ve seen in the San Gabriels so far this year, but don’t go racing out to try them. You could hit only the most conservative lines in the b.c. and watch every turn like a hawk, but why bother? Continued new snow and stormy weather should make in-bounds skiing your mode of choice through the weekend. Be patient—and safe!

Looking out the window here at fairly menacing clouds that haven’t managed to do much in the way of rain or snow in the local mountains thus far.

Mt. Baldy reported a trace of snow overnight. Ie: nothing.

This storm is notable for its cold temps—very cold. I’m brewing up another cup of tea down here in not-so-sunny SoCal to chase away the shivers. Just doesn’t seem fair to see a snow level around 3600′ without any snow. Lots of different reports on weather possibilities, with some models suggesting a major Sierra Storm event later this week or early next. Appears to be agreement that we’re in a strengthening La Nina event, thanks to cool Pacific temps. Take this news as you will. Historically, La Nina translates to drought in California, but I suspect we’ve tinkered with the climate enough to introduce a lot of confusion into historical data-based models.

Clearly, this hasn’t been a banner Sierra winter so far, but if we can eek out a few big storms, at least that will keep things covered enough to keep skiing. I’m hoping for a big winter: there are a few big lines I’m eying that will only open up with heavy snows.

No photos this time, but yesterday I climbed up West Baldy with a partner and then skied down to the hut. We started the day around 7:30 at Manker Flat, carrying skis on packs to the hut, for a nice 2000 vertical foot warm up hike. From the hut, we were able to skin up the rest of the way, zig-zagging up the south side of Baldy Bowl to the ridge and beyond.

Conditions were quite warm. Even in January, solar radiation on the Bowl’s easterly and southeasterly aspects had triggered a few wet slides. With current temperatures, you probably wouldn’t want to be up there after 2 p.m. or so. More interestingly, we observed numerous slab avalanche remains from the past storm. These formed overwhelmingly on northeasterly ridgetops where wind-loaded snow had piled atop an obvious and very slick ice crust in the 9000′ to 10,000′ elevation range.

Based on our very informal tests, the snow has since bonded well to the ice, making for a stable snowpack until the sun nukes it. But this would likely be a layer worth watching as the season develops. Perhaps more importantly, it was certainly eye-opening to see so many naturally-triggered slabs. I don’t expect that when I’m in the San Gabriels. To be fair, these slabs were all quite small in both volume and area, and very localized. But there were many of them, especially along West Baldy’s southeast ridge (more…)

Here’s a look at Mount Baldy’s north face (Mt. San Antonio) as seen from the summit of Baden-Powell on Saturday.

Compared to last year’s bare rock, the sight of all this snow in the San Gabriels is surely cause for celebration, though in truth you’re probably looking at about 2′ of coverage, so let’s keep hoping for a few more big storms.

I zoomed in on the north face to try to spot any natural avalanches. I didn’t see anything at all, though I have to say Baldy’s north face strikes me as one of the most likely places in the entire range where skiers or snowboarders could get into trouble. This shady, high (10,000′) face is big and broad, windswept, and just possibly cold enough to build a layered snowpack instead of the usual mank-on-its-way-to-doom Southern California snow.

Yesterday I skied Baden-Powell in the San Gabriel Mountains with the Man Formerly Known as Bullet.

Conditions were excellent—much better than I was expecting.

We parked at Vincent Gap and immediately began hiking up the steep northeast ridge on snow.

After 1300 vertical feet or so, the angle moderated, allowing us to switch to skis and skins for the rest of the ascent. We were treated to impressive views of Mount Baldy’s north face, which was looking very tempting itself. The snow varied greatly with aspect and location. Wherever the sun had touched it, the snow was well on its way to corn. Elsewhere, we saw everything from crusts to still-savory powder, with an average settled depth around two feet.

After taking the requisite photos of ourselves posing on the summit with downtown L.A. in the background, we skied a few turns on the upper east face, then cut back to the ridge for a 2700 vertical foot descent through unexpectedly fine powder back to the car. All in all, it was a fantastic day in the SoCal backcountry.

Perhaps not surprisingly, we weren’t alone. We saw several other skiers on Baden-Powell, plus a snowboarder or two hiking up. And driving out, incoming traffic to Mountain High at 2 p.m. was backed up past Wrightwood all the way to Highway 138—the worst I’ve ever seen it. It pays to get there early!

It’s 8:00 a.m. here at the SierraDescents command center. Normally about now I’d be driving up to the Mount Baldy Ski Area parking lot, getting ready for a preposterously big SoCal ski day courtesy of the weekend’s WonderStorm.

Instead, it’s full-time fathering duties on the agenda today: chasing the little one around the house all day, with interspaced attempts to grab some rest in between diaper changes and meals.

Mount Baldy reports three feet of new snow on their site—enough to open the runs down to the parking lot—and just across the way, Mountain High says they got two feet, with East and West and all runs open. –sigh– Get up there if you can. It should be a great day of skiing and riding.