It was the winter no one can forget.
From the Sierra Nevada to Utah’s Cottonwoods, ski resorts got slammed, over and over again, until the snow piled so high that it obscured chairlifts, houses, and the natural features that, usually, help separate one trail from the next.
We’re talking about the 2022-23 ski season. It answered a question that skiers often bandy about on chairlifts and in dark, crowded bars: is there such a thing as too much snow?
The answer, it turns out, might be yes. Take a trip down memory lane as ski filmmaker Scott Gaffney explores “Snowmaggedon.” Tap or click to watch below.
Gaffney, who directed many of your favorite ski movies (he’s a longtime Matchstick Productions guy), offered some context behind the short video in a social media post.
“The craziest thing about these images is that the snow so dwarfed the homes that it made them appear fake, like a child’s playset of model houses,” he wrote. “But no, most of them are massive two and three story structures.”
He added that it took him three years to get around to compiling the footage, writing, “To be fair, when I shot them, we were a little busy keeping our heads above water, shoveling and snowblowing like they were full-time jobs.”
Shoveling, indeed.
Palisades Tahoe, one of the best-known Lake Tahoe ski resorts, tallied 723 inches, well above its average annual snowfall of 400 inches. In March, 191 inches fell, or about 16 feet. Thanks to all the snow, Palisades Tahoe kept its lifts spinning until early July.
Courtesy Palisades Tahoe
As evidenced by Gaffney’s video, that didn’t just mean non-stop powder days, though. Locals spent much of the winter digging themselves out from the towering mounds of snow.
And the hammering wasn’t limited to Lake Tahoe.
Further south, Mammoth Mountain, California, hit nearly 900 inches at its summit. Utah’s Alta Ski Area recorded 903 inches. I vividly remember one of my friends who lives in Salt Lake City complaining—complaining!—about the lack of clear days.
What a strange and fantastical time it was.
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