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La Porte loves the snow
Ted Clinton could not remember such a snowless season in nearly 30 years.
So on Saturday, when the flakes came falling down, he stood on the front porch of his La Porte cabin and smiled as cars slipped on the hill, men revved snowmobile engines and friends socked each other with fistfuls of icy white.
"It's snowed up here about five times this year, but this is the first it's stuck," he said. "Having the snow up here is like the first 100-degree day of summer.'"
By mid-afternoon, cars packed with people were headed up the hillside, their vehicles carving fresh tracks on the road beyond Strawberry Valley. Early in the day, crystals began to dust trees like a coating of powdered sugar as low as Woodleaf and Clipper Mills.
"It's about time," said Tina Shaw, peering out from her La Porte General Store. "After last year, we were not in a big hurry, but now it's been a while."
La Porte received nearly 60 feet of snow last season, and by now some of the buildings had been swallowed up to their second stories in drifts, she said. But only a paltry 3 feet has fallen this year, much to the dismay of people who
own or rent the 300 area cabins and come up for winter snowmobiling, cross-country skiing and snowshoeing.
"No snow does affect business," said Shaw, whose store sells everything from condiments to frozen food to alcohol, and doubles as the La Porte Post Office. "Hopefully, it is finally the beginning of winter."
Flakes fell off and on during the day, sometimes so thick it was impossible to see across the street. Business owners occasionally stepped outside to shovel snow in large scoops from their walkways.
"I'm hoping to have enough snow to go snowmobiling," said Shaw's son, Billy Shaw, early in the day.
He soon was making the first known test run of 2011. After a zoom past the warming hut and back on his snowmobile, he decided to take his dirt bike for a drive, kicking up snow as he went.
Arboga resident Richard Foster was eager to carve through some of the untouched snow.
"We've been waiting every week hoping she comes, and finally, she's here," he said.
In between snowmobile runs, he and friends warmed themselves with sips of schnapps and moonshine on the front porch. Intermittently, they stepped onto Main Street to toss handfuls of snow at one another and duck any ice lobbed in their direction.
The last few weeks of blue skies and warm afternoons have been torture, said Marysville resident Casey Wallace. He normally winters in a La Porte cabin and can finally spend his days on snowmobile-only roads, driving from warming hut to warming hut.
"I'm a snowmobile maniac," he said. "This is what I've been waiting for."
The other joy is sharing the snow with his 10-month-old son, Kane, he said, later tugging the boy on a red sled through town.
La Porte resident Diana Perrault greeted them as they passed. Her Chihuahua, Mama, had been begging for a walk so she donned a puffy purple jacket and they set off through the streets.
"She'd play all day, but her chicken legs would freeze," Perrault said, as Mama licked flakes and pranced in the snow with her tail wagging.
After retiring, Perrault and her husband live in La Porte most of the year unless visiting their children in Sloughhouse. Sun or snow, it's a beautiful place to spend time, she said.
Much of the last month has been T-shirt weather, but the absence of snow was a growing concern as each week passed.
"We need it," she said. "Nature takes care of us up here. You need the snow for the moisture for the trees and the lakes and runoff into the valley. Everything dominoes."
At Reilly's Saloon & Cafe, cook Darlene Griffith said this first winter in La Porte has not been what she expected. Mother Nature teased with an early snowfall the first week of October and again the first week of November, but the skies stayed nearly clear ever since.
"La Porte seems to have its own little weather vortex up here," she said.
But since this latest series of storms rolled in, she's been fielding frequent calls from flatlanders, answering the phone "Reilly's Bar and La Porte Weather Service."
"They are chomping on the bit to come up here," Griffith said. "When the snow hits 2 feet, come on up. We're waiting for you."
CONTACT Ashley Gebb at agebb@appealdemocrat.com or 749-4783. Find her on Facebook at /ADagebb or on Twitter at @ADagebb.
