Day 22
Location: Alpine Meadows, CA
Resorts: 12 out of 50
It was our piss poor luck to ride Alpine Meadows on a lackluster day. Bummer. This mountain is a hell of a fun place. Oh well, at least it didn’t cost us any money. We’ve been taking full advantage of the Descente Jacket Pass Deal. Our jackets came with 40 free lift tickets to resorts around North America. Descente must think that nobody would use more than a few in a season. They’ve never run into us.
We started the day over on the Lakeside Lift and finally got our views of Lake Tahoe. Coco tried to crash a few photos and we even got suckered into “Classic Tourist Pose #1” which is floating somewhere around the site. Then we bounced around the frontside waiting for the sun to transform the icy runs into some mashed potato goodness. After stuffing ourselves with garlic fries, we hiked up and over to the back.
The backside could be loads of fun. Not today. The sun had come out the day before, softened up the backside, then half froze it all during the night. This meant a choppy ride for us, with the partly cloudy conditions never warming up the snow. It’s too bad because there’s a lot happening on the backside of Alpine Meadows. Large bowls seemed to be the order with enough hiking to keep you busy for a whole season.
The sun did peak out a few times during the day and warmed up the chutes near the Three Sisters. These short steeps don’t have large choke points which was perfect for Coco, our Arizona born shredder, who ran her first chute over here.
Apres-Ski Report:
Get to the bottom of the Alpine Meadows Road and settle down at the Crest Cafe. Two reasons: 1) You can wait out the traffic crawl on route 89, and 2) killer happy hour specials. We arrived on a Friday which meant 50 cent wings and $1.50 pints of PBR. We grabbed a huge plate of regular, garlic Parmesan, and some sort of terayaki goodness.
The Cheat Sheet:
Alpine Meadows Ski Area
2600 Alpine Meadows Road
Alpine Meadows, CA
Crest Cafe
50 Alpine Meadows Road
Alpine Meadows, CA
Descente Jacket Deal
40 free lift tickets with purchase of jacket
