Surprise Snow Excites Lake Tahoe Ski Resorts

Much of the winter weather conversation this week has involved ski resorts in Colorado or Utah, but Lake Tahoe, California, got in on the fun, too, with Palisades Tahoe receiving its first measurable snowfall of the season on October 17, 2024.

The resort also gave the snowy dusting a boost by firing up its snow guns.

Per Palisades Tahoe’s webcams , much of the snow that fell has now melted, and about a month remains until the resort’s planned opening date of November 27th. Last winter, the resort—among others around Lake Tahoe—had a slow start with limited pre-season precipitation but still managed to spin the lifts in November. Thankfully, there's plenty of time in the days and weeks ahead to build a solid base.

Snow guns obviously help with those efforts. Over the past year, snowmaking at Palisades Tahoe has received a boost to the tune of $1.4 million. Improvements associated with the investment include a new booster pump—which is slated to improve water transfer to snowmaking systems across the resort—and additional fan guns at the base of Gold Coast. In a blog post , Palisades Tahoe wrote that the latter will allow terrain to open more quickly.

Elsewhere, other Lake Tahoe-area ski resorts also enjoyed the wintry weather, and at Mt. Rose-Ski Tahoe, the snow guns are still cranking. The resort’s base area webcam shows patches of white below its snowmaking fleet.

Northstar began snowmaking last night for the first time this season. Alongside several other Epic Pass resorts, including Whistler Blackcomb, Heavenly, and Park City Mountain, Northstar aims to open on November 22nd, weather and conditions permitting.

Outside California, winter touched down at ski resorts throughout North America this week, populating the internet with welcoming, snowy images that heralded the coming season. At the time of writing this, it's snowing at both Whistler Blackcomb and Arapahoe Basin .

If it wasn’t apparent already, the pre-season—and perhaps soon, the early season—is upon us. The current snow storms may or may not expedite those eagerly-awaited opening dates (it all depends if it stays cold), but they, at the very least, have cranked the stoke levels just a bit higher.

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