Ellis Peak Ski Tour
3/16/19
I recently recruited some new friends in my goal to climb all 63 peaks on the OGUL list. The lure? That I’ll have a party when I complete them all, and you’re only invited if you’ve climbed an OGUL with me. :)
Ellis Peak is on the west shore of Lake Tahoe behind Homewood Ski Resort. The easiest way to get there? Pay for the pricey cat skiing Homewood offers off the summit of Ellis Peak. Since I wasn’t looking to spend a few hundred dollars to bag this peak, my own two legs were the option I was left with. In January of this year, I attempted Ellis with my friends Andy and Brice from the Blackwood Canyon sno-park. This proved to be a pretty long route. We went up Blackwood Ridge to its high-point (which took us about ~3.5mi), and saw the summit was still more than 2mi away — with a lot of descent in between. Plus, it looked like the ski out would be a long slog, and the snow on the ridge we had just climbed was in awesome condition, so we opted to do two laps on that instead.
Fast forward two months to mid-March. The Sierra has had storm after storm after storm this winter, and this is the first clear weekend since the weekend in January when I last attempted Ellis. For a new attempt, I enlisted Leo and Sadie this time (Sadie just so happens to be Brice’s partner — and Brice has already done an OGUL with me, so now hopefully they can attend together ;) ).
Looking for a shorter route this time, I decided it would be worth trying to skirt the north edge of Homewood until we pass the resort. From there, it looked like an easy skin up to the summit (which could be made even easier if we caught the cat track from the cat skiing). Homewood has no uphill travel allowed, so this was my main concern. Would the terrain just outside the resort be too steep? Would it be hard to stay outside the resort (and would employees care)?
We set off from the resort parking lot around 8:30am, passing the lift they have at the base. One employee spinning up a lift asked where we were headed, and we said just outside the resort. He remarked “don’t get caught!” which left me feeling a little uneasy at the start. Once past those lifts, we had to navigate some huge snow banks in a small neighborhood, which was a little confusing. We did manage to get on a slope though and started to head up, hoping we were outside the resort.
We soon came upon a groomed road to our left. We assumed this to be the edge of the resort, so we just kept to its right. The terrain to the right was usually reasonable, but at a few sections it was quite steep and awkward to traverse, so we popped on to the very edge of the groomed road. A snowmobiler (presumably from the resort) passed us as we were on the road once, but they just waved as they passed.
Soon enough the terrain opened up and it become easy to stay just outside the resort. By now the resort had opened, so we could see people coming down the runs. We paralleled the groomed road until reaching the end of the resort, as planned, and then headed up a gully until we reached Lake Louise. We crossed the lake and headed up another slope, where we were able to catch the cat track, making the remaining climb to the summit quite trivial (with the exception of looking over my shoulder every 15 seconds to make sure I wasn’t going to get run over).
The views from the summit were spectacular (as they typically are on a bluebird day from a summit in Tahoe). Desolation Wilderness to the south, Castle Peak area to the north, and gorgeous views of the lake. We took our time eating lunch before transitioning. As we were finishing up, sure enough the snow cat showed up, unloaded a dozen people, and then turned around.
We skied down a more northern aspect than we had come up, hoping to find nicer snow in the very warm weather. We were only mildly successful. The terrain is nice trees, but it was just too warm and sunny. Before long we were back at the edge of the resort, skiing adjacent the groomed road we had paralleled on the ascent. We were back at the parking lot by 2:30pm. Overall, it was a nice tour and a great way to summit Ellis. The terrain back there is nice, though a bit chopped up in a few parts because of the cat operation. Getting around the resort could be more difficult if the resort employees give you a hard time, but I suspect if you head out before the lifts start spinning it’s no problem.
