Another Peak: Reflections On A Ski Season Well Spent

I lived plenty close to the lake (I stared it at from my room, in fact) but I hadn't once used the surfboard I'd brought for fetch, or wind swell, I was promised by Jeremy Jones at San Onofre shortly before driving the 8 hours north to Tahoe. 

To say it was low tide was an understatement. It was December, but you wouldn't know by looking at the terrain. While low tide conditions are a blessing for surfing, they are mostly seen as an inconvenience for skiing. Besides opening up new lines that would soon become covered, there was little to get excited about by the lack of snow. Barely any lifts were spinning. 

Plus, I am what my friends chidingly refer to as a "resort rat", through and through. 

But the poor conditions proved to be a blessing, as I met one of my good ski friends on this very hike. We checked off the boxes around the resort, he was a Squ*llywood guy, and he later described me to his friends as the skier he met "hiking low-tide Si-bowl." 

I recognized him by his bright jacket, and if I saw him on the bootpack up Mainline Pocket, I'd quickly follow, lugging my heavy, in-bound skis over my shoulder, trying to make time to catch up. 

Later in the season we would find heaven off KT-22 days after a powder day, beautiful turns off Summit Chair at Alpine Meadows, and his face would light up pointing out different lines and their approaches. 

We shared the thrill of living so close to an iconic, historic resort, something that mattered to everyone but was joyfully expressed by few. 

Some days were spent alone. Some of the best days, really. The occasional Wednesday morning in waist-deep, untracked powder. Getting first chair on Scott, and then first tracks down Scott Chute while people hooted and hollered. 

I have known happiness many times in my life, but coming from the East Coast, I had never experienced such pure bliss. Once I got a taste, there was no return. 

Skiing became a full-on search, just like surfing. Watching conditions, learning spots and angles and crowds. "Winter on the north shore" no longer meant Oahu, it meant the north shore of Lake Tahoe, and swell turned to pow, lifeguards turned to ski patrol, peaks turned to, well, different peaks. 

There was a similar satisfaction in scoring, a familiar tiredness when your body once again turns itself in for dreams of what the day held. 

And, like surfing, no matter how good you once got it--perhaps the better you got it--there lives an insatiable hunt for more.