Alaska Airlines Magazine, Horizon Edition, May 2011Despite 2011's complete glossing-over of spring (not counting the lovely month of Juneuary that followed upon the Great Christmas Blizzard of 2010), we're still hanging onto the deeper belief that summer in the high country is why we're here...
"They say Mammoth sees at least 300 days of sunshine per year. Tucked as it is into the eastern slope of the Sierra Nevada, at the western edge of the vast high desert we call the Great Basin, Mammoth's upper elevations get almost a third more precipitation annually than, say, Seattle. But 90% of it comes in the form of snow, between November and April.
"From May through October, by contrast, the days are clear and dry, with average highs in the 70s and 80s. The sun shines. The snow trickles into a thousand streams and boggy meadows teeming with wildflowers. The bikes come out, and the golf clubs. Bald eagles and osprey work the lakes for winter-fat rainbow trout. Saddle horses take standing naps in the shade of aspen trees, and hikers head upcountry into one of the largest roadless wildernesses in North America..."
Read the full story in the May issue of ALASKA AIRLINES MAGAZINE, HORIZON EDITION (pp. 12-21)...