Ski and Snowboard News, Deals, and Events

That snowboarders hell known as the Skyline Trail at Heavenly Mountain Resort is now a thing of the past.

What was formerly a generally flat cat track that provided access from the top of the Sky Express chair on the California side to the upper reaches of the resort's Nevada side has been regraded and widened to enable single plankers - as well as skiers - a much less taxing egress to the Dipper/Milky Way bowl nexus.

While they were modifying Skyline Trail, Heavenly decided to cut a couple of new runs off it, producing gladed trails in the Ski Ways area. The resort also created another gladed run lower down the California side of the mountain in the Powderbowl Woods.

Heavenly also doubled the number of indoor seats at East Peak Lodge - where, as at the mountain's other lodges, you can avail yourself of 100 percent Certified Organic Starbucks coffee and Fair-Trade espresso - expanded and remodeled the rental shop at the California Lodge, added six new, low-emission grooming machines to their fleet of Prinoth350 snow cats, and installed a magic carpet surface lift at the California ski school.

As with any other projected contained in Heavenly's Master Plan Amendment, the above improvements were designed "to minimize environmental impact and maximize water clarity from the watersheds draining Heavenly, earning the endorsement of the League to Save Lake Tahoe," says resort spokesman Russ Pecoraro.

What could be more Heavenly?