Palisades Tahoe and Alpine Meadows have received a foot of snow from Wednesday's storm and according to forecasts, this is the beginning of what could be a multi-day storm cycle with the potential to bring significant additional snow to the Lake Tahoe resorts by Christmas.

From Palisades Tahoe's News Release...

[Olympic Valley and Alpine Meadows, Calif.] December 12, 2012 – Palisades Tahoe and Alpine Meadows have received a foot of snow in the last 24 hours. This snow kicks off the start of what could be a substantial storm cycle with the potential to bring several feet of snow to the Lake Tahoe resorts by Christmas.

Thanks to the fresh snow, Palisades Tahoe will be running 15 lifts and Alpine Meadows will be running five lifts. Thursday also marks the opening day for the Mountain Run at Palisades Tahoe, allowing guests to ski and ride from top to bottom via the resort’s longest trail, which covers 3.2 miles of intermediate terrain. In addition to the five current lifts, Alpine Meadows has announced that the resort will also run the Hot Wheels chairlift starting on Friday.

In addition to the foot of natural snowfall, the crews at Palisades Tahoe and Alpine Meadows are taking full advantage of the low temperatures and are hard at work blowing snow. With the help of nearly $5 million in snowmaking improvements, the crews are maximizing the new systems to further add to the snow at both resorts.

Snow showers are predicted to continue through this week, with substantially more snow on the horizon. Next week looks to bring several cold, back-to-back storms starting on Tuesday. Long range forecasters are predicting that Tuesday-Friday could bring several more feet of powder to the mountains, possibly bringing four to five feet of new snow to the mountains by Christmas if the current forecast holds for the next 10 days.

For more information and operations updates visit www.squaw.com