State Swim Meet - Edison's Junior Year

Edison and the Shorecrest Boys Swim Team had a good prelims day at the State Meet. Many had strong swims and are returning for finals. Edison ended up as an alternate for finals, finishing in 18th place in the 100 Back with a season-best time of 56.58. Considering he had not been able to prepare fully in the fall and train as hard as he wanted this season due to his back sprain, it is a pretty darn good result. From up in the parent section above the pool deck, it was fun to watch Edison being a good teammate during the meet - cheering for teammates, engaging others in lively conversations, handing out the high fives, and connecting with his swim friends and coaches on other high school teams. Swimming, like all youth sports, has been a great teacher over the years in terms of its life lessons. He has had some exceptional coaches and mentors, including Coach Scott Kelly. It has also been a foundation for a number of Edison’s friendships and a healthy and active approach to life. It is crazy to think that he has one more high school season left!

Midwinter Ski Trip in Snowy Tahoe!

I was fortunate to fly into Reno on Monday and drive here without incident though it was snowing lightly. The storm really cranked up in intensity overnight and they are calling for 3-5 FEET of snow before this storm cycle is done. I am feeling fortunate that I was able to ski Monday afternoon. Tuesday was like blizzard-white out conditions with the Heavenly gondola closed for high winds. The roads were bad and I couldn’t get to the other base areas. I ventured out to swim in the pool, soak in the hot tub, and walk around the neighborhood. They’ve probably gotten about 15” of snow since last night and it is still snowing hard. Wind gusts are up to 70 mph. I’m feeling lucky to be safe and warm and not needing to drive at the moment. But I’m kind of bummed I wasn’t able to ski today and was stuck inside! Too snowy to ski?! What?! 

Tuesday - the storm!

Wednesday update: Heavenly Mountain was gifted 40” of incredible snow in the last 24 hours. It is so cold here (13F), that it is staying fluffy powder which is fantastic! Skiing on powder in these conditions feels like a dream. It has been so long since I’ve enjoyed a powder day that I almost forgot how magical it is. Everyone is in a good mood, there’s room to spread out, plenty of powder for everyone, every steep run gets a bit easier. I don’t push it or do too much in the woods when I’m skiing solo on a powder day, so it was just good vibes all around and an exhilarating feeling of floating and gliding almost effortlessly. So fun and worth all the trouble to make it happen! Though every skier has a heavy heart for the backcountry skiers who died near Castle Peak in the Sierras this week in an avalanche.

As one can imagine, there are some inconveniences when a town and mountain receive multiple feet of snow in one day. The gondola was closed for ice accumulation and I had to take a shuttle over to the California Lodge base. This took about 1.5 hours to complete. The lifts couldn’t open on time because they had to be dug out. The first lift (Gunbarrel) opened at 10:00 AM, but everyone had to ride up on that four-person chair, so that took another 45 minutes. The lines were long until other lifts started to open throughout the day after the incredibly hard work of the staff of Heavenly to be operational under these conditions. I even had the good fortune to be able to ride up Sky Express (it hasn’t been open since I arrived due to wind) in order to get back over to the part of the mountain to access the Gondola and avoid the shuttle. I did that trek as my last runs of the day and it was extreme white out conditions with snow blowing sideways and almost pushing me backwards on my skis on the cat tracks at some points. But, I was happy to make it safely home in the end.

I finished up in Tahoe skiing another day at Heavenly on Thursday. A second storm system came in - there was another foot of powder on top of the previous 3.5’. So it was deep. It was also very windy and the snow was still coming down, so mostly my phone stayed in my pocket. I was happy to be able to ride the gondola straight up and get started skiing - I go there so early that I was on the second gondola and the snow was untracked and totally unbelievable. I enjoy powder, but it also scares me a bit and people who were falling were getting buried and having a hard time getting up. Additionally, anyone who ended up in a flat area was having a challenging time getting out by wading through waist-deep snow. I did end up following Tim, whom I met on a chairlift, and we traversed over to the Milky Way Bowl and hiked up a bit. The snow over there was unreal - dropping into an almost untouched bowl and just going for it. Or - he went for it and I took my time - doing a few turns, resting my legs, doing a few more, etc. I was really happy with myself for doing that run and not falling and having to dig out. The visibility was pretty bad all day and got worse as the storm picked up. They started closing chairlifts due to wind and at that point, I called it a day, fearing they’d close the gondola and I’d have to ski down to California Lodge and wait hours for a shuttle.

Back in town, I enjoyed one more afternoon of the hot tub and sauna before fully checking out and staying at the Black Jack Inn. (I’d decided to extend my trip but couldn’t get another night at the Marriott. By early evening the weather had cleared and I took a nice walk around the neighborhood and to the lake. It is wild to compare the before/after pictures from my first walk on Monday before the storm hit.

I was very nervous to drive to the airport in Reno on Friday morning. But I put my rental Pathfinder in snow mode and we did just fine as the road crews have been doing some herculean work of plowing the roads, though for much of the drive I was still on a layer of about 4” of snow and ice. I never got a bluebird day in Tahoe to enjoy the views, but I got to ski the powder and that was pretty darn special! I’ll be back!