Finally, snow in Tahoe!

Momma has been anxiously watching the weather report that was optimistic that with the latest storm front the mountains in Tahoe would finally get some snow. In fact, they were also predicting snow all the way down to lake levels in a storm that moved through late Thursday. (P.S. She highly recommends the Tahoe Daily Snow Report that is produced by a local guy (Bryan) that shares lots of information on the different models he uses to predict snowfall. As the storms approach he definitely is the most accurate person to be following.)

So, we knew it was snowing on Thursday night and momma is just like a little kid in the way she LOVES snow. I mean she is crazy about it. She thinks it is so pretty and so fun. I guess it is because she grew up in Minnesota back in the day when it used to snow there all the time in the winter. Our muzzy tells us it doesn’t snow like that in Minnesota anymore. When she was a little kid she would spend all day playing outside in the snow. She also really likes to eat it, just like I do!

Anyways, back to Friday. We got up and went on a long walk and came home to train so it definitely seemed like we weren’t going to do anything special since we didn’t get out early or having anything packed up. But, when I was eating my breakfast (which takes forever because she stuffs it in a Kong) I saw her taking her sleeping bag, puffy coat, and our “emergency” kit out to the car so I knew something was up!

She then loaded up Lolo and I and we were off. I was very excited so I stood up the whole time like I do when we head to the east (which means Tahoe!) just so momma can have a smiley face in the rear view mirror while she is driving. We hadn’t been in the car for more than an hour before we saw snow REALLY early on our drive into the mountains. Like lower than we have ever seen it! Momma was happy that the chain controls were lifted, and felt confident the roads were clear and it seemed like we timed it just right. Because when we pulled into the Sno-Park parking lot there were only a couple of other vehicles there (although several were right behind us as momma got all geared up) and we got to lay FRESH TRACKS the whole way into the forest!

Momma had put a loud jingle bell on Lolo’s collar before we left the car to see if it would be easier to hear where he is in space (although honestly he hardly gets out of sight, ever because he needs to be with momma like ALL THE TIME) but, he was able to lose it within 5 minutes of leaving the car. So momma tried to look around for it in the snow, but it was futile. There was just too much snow! We were swimming in it!

At first momma thought we could head up to Frog Lake, but noticed that the streams were really running with a lot of water still, which means that water is coming from down the mountain and through the tunnels under the highway, so we decided to try to make our Lake Angela loop up by Boreal instead.

Lolo and I had a great time running around and sniffing out critters that were laying tracks in the snow. We sometimes dig down into the snow because they are tunneling underneath, too!

As we got really close to Lake Angela momma noticed there were a few storm clouds dropping snow up on the highest peaks in the direction we were headed and thought we maybe shouldn’t try to make our own loop back to the car in case the snow showers got really heavy, or it got really windy or something like that. I was a little annoyed because I knew it would take us longer to go back the way we came than it would to find our own trail, but momma said winter isn’t the time to be doing stupid things like making our own trail, especially in really deep snow like that.

So, we turned around and went back, which is when I started complaining about having balls of snow jammed up in my feet. Momma patiently cleaned them out for me time and again. I am not sure why Lolo doesn’t mind the balls of snow jammed in his feet, but he just keeps running around like a maniac with them anyways. We both had balls of snow hanging everywhere from our fur – and Lolo’s were HUGE like baseballs hanging off his butt! It was hilarious. Our bandanas totally froze up too, momma thought it was very cute 🙄

Finally, after 4.5 hours of plowing through the snow we made it back to the car. Lolo and I live a totally cushy life because momma turned on our seat heater to help us melt our snow balls and warm up on the way home. By the time we got home it was already dark out and almost dinner time. We were both SO TIRED from all that playing in the snow that Loks didn’t even try to get momma to throw the ball across the house for him 100x like he does every other night. That’s how momma and daddy KNOW we are tired!

This afternoon, my daddy came home with a pair of snowshoes he rented for us to go back and snowshoe tomorrow in the mountains – I wonder WHERE in Tahoe we will go!!!