The fact that Mammoth Mountain squeezed 199 days out of the 2025-2026 season would have sounded like a modern miracle just over two months ago. The Eastern Sierra resort holds the title of California’s highest ski area — 11,053 feet at its summit — and a solid operations infrastructure that regularly makes it the last place running in the Golden State. But still, as we were all sweating our way through March and resorts all over the region were starting to drop (close) like flies, making it through Memorial Day didn’t even seem like a possibility.
A Miracle March may not have been in the books but April made up for that by contributing more than four feet of snow to the late-season total. Sprinkle in a couple of May storms, and Mammoth Mountain reached a surprising 297″ of snow at the Main Lodge, according to an email from the resort this week. That’s still a reach from the mountain’s typical season average, but a number that doesn’t make the 25-26 season sound as torturous as many will remember. In fact, that’s more than all but two season totals since 2019-2020 (367″ in 2023-2024 and 715″ in 2022-2023).
And in the end it all added up to 199 days. Day 199 looked like a fun one for anybody who got their final turns of the season in. Images from the resort show a decent turnout, beautiful skies, and yes, a lot of bone dry terrain accessed by the last three lifts left running: the Broadway Express, Face Lift Express, and Chair 23.
“While there were plenty of ups and downs, we are reflecting on just how much fun we had from November all the way into June,” the resort said on Monday.
The season’s in the bag for California. And good riddance. But the promise of an El Niño coming down the pipe might be a well-deserved comfort.
