Betting on the cold.
Last winter Snow Summit opened 4 of 33 trails at its peak drought. This fall the snow guns are testing and Big Bear is counting down to a November opener.
Big Bear Lake and Mammoth Lakes, CA · fall 2026 · Published
01 / The story
Last winter was hard on the hill. In early February, KVCR reported Snow Summit had just 4 of its 33 trails open. Goldsmith's Sports estimated its rental business was down about 70 percent, and the Big Bear Chamber talked about holiday weekends that never came.
This season Big Bear Mountain Resort has not set an official opening date. The earliest Snow Summit can open is November 21, with Snow Valley and Bear Mountain no earlier than November 27. The resort posted snowmaking test photos on October 29. Snowmaking needs temperatures in the low 20s, low humidity and light wind. New this year is a two-day Double Play ticket for $149. Up north, Mammoth saw a dusting at McCoy Station on September 28 that was gone by morning, and is aiming to open November 13, which would make it the first resort in California to spin lifts.
02 / The take
The image of the Southern California snow season is a machine. A snow gun firing a white plume over a dry brown slope at 4 a.m., while the town below waits on a weather app. It is the most hopeful piece of hardware on the mountain.
Our ski areas sit two hours from the beach. You can surf in the morning and ride by the afternoon, and that is not a slogan, it is geography. But it means every opening day here is earned, made one cold night at a time.
03 / The thread
Heavyweight cotton for the drive up the hill in the dark, the parking-lot coffee and the first chair. The hoodie is the uniform for the cold half of the day.