Kirkwood, CA April 17-18, 2025 (and some Heavenly)

Thursday, April 17, 2025
I left San Jose at 5:30 AM and got to Kirkwood in 3 hrs 20 min, even with stop at Tracy Costco that is a mile from and on wrong side of I205 and for coffee and a donut in Lockeford. Photo of Pilot with 4 sixes (I have deposit on new vehicle that should arrive early June) and sunrise just past Tracy.


I dressed for skiing in parking area in front of Greg’s house and gave him a ride to skiing. We parked very close to and loaded the Reut after 9:45 (didn’t start SkiTracks until at top of chair). We skied Race Course run under the chair which was in good shape, but a little firm. We crossed bumpy area where snowcats had taken snow to build pond for event this weekend getting to only high-speed chair running Cornice. We alternated a couple of Zachary and Sentinel laps finding that cats must had concentrated on building pond vs. grooming steep parts of runs. Lower Olympic, which is part of the return from Sentinel was smoothly groomed, but most of lower Zachary was not. After 7 laps on Cornice, leaving via soft and bumpy, E-facing Monte Wolfe with me going over to take photo of long wiggle on right side then exiting on Mokelumne, we moved back to Reut. Better photo of wiggle taken from Wall chair and photo of The Wall taken from chair almost at top of Reut.

We did two laps on Reut with me once skiing some great corn on Shotgun before moving to the Wall for a couple of laps. Wall Entrance taken 4/18
The top was still firm, but they’d put in an extra turn on entrance road below the usual one. I found good softening snow on far side of the Wall, then skied the sunnier side of gully under lift. We crossed Buckboard and followed some guys down Waterfall, which was softening, even though NW-facing into the drain. We also went once down some of Headwaters to get higher on Norm’s Nose than you can from Reut and skied some untracked corduroy into Shotgun where I skied edge of day-old groom as ungroomed was too soft. After three laps on Wall we moved back to Cornice skiing Sentinel and Zachary’s again, then Janek into steep face between there and Olympic, then other side of steep face from Olympic.

Greg had a 230 appt. with cable guy at his place. Since shuttle was only running at far as Timber Creek base, where lifts were not running, he took my SUV back to his place. I did two more laps on the Wall, then one on Cornice, skiing E-facing Zachary’s which was starting to firm up as it was out of direct sun even though temp was still high. I finished with two more laps on the Wall cautiously skiing a big entrance after enjoying a Maui lite that I liked enough that I will try to get more at SLT Grocery Outlet.

I entered a few times between chair and small rock to right and on my last run I carefully entered to right of small rock.

Besides skiing Headwaters into excellent Wagon Trail and not as good Short Spoke (aka Race Course) where some firm snow or a block almost through me, I twice skied Notch Chute, once cutting right and skiing the still-covered cliff Greg found two weeks ago. I quit at 3:30 with over 30K on SkiTracks which I had to re-start when phone dropped to 20% charge. Photos added with an edit, then added next photo (parking area and view of Red Cliffs from Greg's cabin and lady walking dog up street) and Heavenly to title with another edit.

Kirkwood and Heavenly, CA Friday, April 18, 2025
Greg and I parked close to and loaded the Reut about 930. It was clear, with a harder overnight freeze than previous day, and wind from E/NE was strong. We skied firm, but smoothly groomed, Wagon Trail to Cornice chair. Short Spoke/Race Course was not groomed. Greg had thought he needed to be in Oakdale for a Memorial service at noon and wouldn’t be able to ski, but realized he needed to leave before noon so he could ski for an hour and a half and wanted to maximize his time using high-speed Cornice. We both were wearing vests as on previous day, but wind was strong enough and temp never rose much at top where weather station said high temp with wind chill reached at 1 PM was 13, before dropping to 10 as wind picked up to 50 mph at 1:30.

We skied E-facing, groomed Zachary’s 5x before Greg had to leave. Snow was firm, there was some unevenness between groomer passes but that got better as skiers smoothed it out and added some loose snow. I went to my SUV when Greg had to leave to swap my vest for a thin jacket that is not windproof and a little warmer than vest. I did a few more Zachary’s, skied very firm but easy to get to (due to firm snow and wind) Sentinel once and once follow two guys traversing to Palisades where I skied SE-facing corn before catching exit that returns to Cornice. On last lap before moving to Wall, I tried ungroomed Monte Wolfe but found I had to ski far left which faces a little more SE to find easily edge-able snow and some corn. Lower on mountain Mokelumne was good, as was lower Olympic, the return from Palisades and Sentinel.

I went up the Wall, which I think had been on a firm snow hold early and seemed to stop a lot when they started loading the few people willing to brave it, at noon. Patrol watched me ski the very firm bumps off the entrance road. I skied Eagle Bowl twice, finding good corn by skiing SE-facing from near Norm’s Nose, but it was not worth the rattling, too firm snow on about half the vertical. I next skied Reut once, trying upper Shotgun, but finding it too firm and cut through trees to get back to Wagon Train which was still smooth, fast and very good. I returned to Cornice for three laps, but found too much snow had been scraped off and piled up on Zachary’s and Monte Wolfe was no better so I cut back to Zachary’s. I quit about 1:40 with 21K and was on the road to Heavenly by 1:45.

My drive to Heavenly took 44 min. I missed a tram and did not want to wait for next one, so I put on skis and skated to CA Lodge where I re-filled my water bottle and used restroom. I loaded Gunbarrel at 2:45 and saw lower Gunbarrel run looked roped off. I skied too soft Patsy’s and went up Powder Bowl chair and skied to Sky chair that I would ride 6x, skiing good fast groomers. The only only black runs I skied were getting shady and thin Sky Canyon, and groomed again, lightly skied and excellent Ridge Bowl. I might have been able to get another lap, but had twice waited at (Heavenly’s only very windy place) at the top for about 5 minutes for nephew who I thought was coming up but he did not. After skiing sunny with big soft bumps Waterfall, I loaded Groove behind him and two young ladies he was skiing with.

I went through high entrance into the Face and skied East Bowl. Middle Gunbarrel may have had better coverage, but I had not looked at it closely when going up chair and being more shaded may have been too firm. On East Bowl, you wanted to turn on S-facing side or top of moguls as N-facing sides were firm and downhill, W-facing were chopped off.
I got through the manzanita without removing my ski or falling as I saw other doing. I did scrape off snow to dirt once, but I was moving slow and did no damage. World Cup, bottom of East Bowl, was still good. I quit at 4:25 with 11.2K.