Leon Turnbull Photography

It felt like a long time coming but winter has finally arrived in Northern California. It WAS a long time coming. However, as of Dec 1, we are almost back to average for precipitation this winter in Northern CA, and we ARE above average in Central and Southern Sierra. You heard that right: Not “below average”, but “above average”, thanks to a couple big late November storms, praise be to God who provides. In Northern CA, we are at 83% of average. In Central Sierra: 118% of average, and Southern Sierra: 147% of average. The snow pack is very similar: 82% North, 117% Central, and 128% for Southern Sierra as of Dec 1. This is fantastic news! I am not sure if the rain and snow will continue strong into December; there look to be a few storms in the next week or two but nothing really big.

So …. What’s the deal, man?

We always have dry periods throughout the winter. This is why I only tally the totals at the end of each month, not during the middle of the month. This year, our “first” dry period (and it won’t be the last one) began right at the beginning of the year, and in mid November we were at only 20% average for the year. But in two storms, we are now above average overall. Why bust your hearts looking at daily stats?

Sadly, the slow start was a major contributor to the Camp Fire, which was an awful and devastating catastrophe. But it did not cause the fire, nor did global warming cause it. The fire was caused by humans, (as are the vast majority of fires, by the way). Frankly, it makes me mad because the fire was (most likely) caused by PG&E negligence, and it should never have happened in the first place, and they did the exact same thing last year in Napa. Global warming should not be used as an excuse for accepting that devastating fires will occur. Do not say fires are the “new normal”. Let’s prevent fires from starting in the first place by being responsible.

I hear a lot that global warming is causing the drought in California. That is what everyone says, but is it true? What are the facts? Gimme the facts, man. If it is true, then shouldn’t we see an increasing pattern of dry winters in California? Yet:

2009 – avg
2010 – above avg
2011 – above avg
2012 – below avg
2013 – below avg
2014 – below avg
2015 – below avg
2016 – above avg (everyone seems to conveniently forget that 2016 was an above avg year, yet this was the year we started to climb out of the drought)
2017 – above avg
2018 – below avg
2019 – ???

I do not see any pattern of increasing dry winters here. Do you? I see an awful drought period, but even with that we have a 50/50 split of good/bad winters over the past 10 years. Going back further in years does not make any difference. Indeed, I checked back 50 years, and for every decade there was pretty much an exact 50/50 split of good vs. bad winters. 50 years! I also checked back 20 years for slow starts to the winter. I only found one other year (2014) that was as bad as this year to start (through mid November). Even so, we still ended up above average by the end of November 2018, and as I said that is why I only tally totals at the end of the month. So again, I do not see any pattern of increasing slow starts to the winter. Do you?

Are we even in a drought in California? What are the facts, man? Southern CA is still in a more serious drought, but Northern CA is not in a drought (or officially I guess you can say it is in a low drought status – which is normal after summer). I think it will all depend on if we have a good winter or a bad winter this year, as to whether we go back into a drought in California. Don’t say we are in a drought before winter has hardly even started. Let’s wait to see what happens by the end of the season. So pray for rain and snow! God is the only one that can seriously help and make a difference.

Anyhow … this photo is the upper waterfall of Bear River Reservoir Falls. It is 21 ft. high in total, including the upper 4 ft. tier. It is a pretty little one, but just a little one.

The latest El Nino forecast has arrived and it continues to increase in strength. It hit the “strong” level in August for the first time. A key factor will be when it peaks. It not showing any sign of peaking yet, but is apparently forecast to max out in the December timeframe. If it peaks too early, it will not have the impact on our winter weather that we are hoping and praying for.

Despite what you may have heard from other forecasters, there have only been FOUR strong El Ninos since 1950. To clarify: four strong El Ninos “in the winter”; three of these had above average rain in California in the winter, and the fourth had “slightly above average” rain. Let me explain: The four strong El Ninos were: 1998, 1983, 1958, and 1973. As we all probably know, the first three had well above average precipitation for northern CA in the winter. No question about that. In 1973, however, I see about 103% of average precipitation for northern CA, noting that this strong El Nino peaked early in November (but still remained strong through the winter). Usually, forecasters referring to 1973 say it was an above average year for this strong El Nino, but I don’t think you can say 103% is “above average”, to me it is more “average”, but if you really want to then say “slightly above average”. The Southern Sierra may have been slightly higher that year.

There were two other strong El Ninos since 1950: 1966 and 1988. Both of these years had well below average winters for northern CA. However, it must be noted that both of these El Ninos were on the very low end of strong; the El Nino of 1988 peaked in the summer and was not strong when winter started; the El Nino of 1966 peaked in November/December and by January it was down to moderate strength. That is a very important distinction. Does it rain in the summer in California? No it doesn’t! So in the heart of winter, these strong El Ninos were not strong! Therefore, in my opinion, it is not appropriate to say El Nino was strong in those years if you are talking about predicting precipitation in the winter for California; they were moderate El Ninos during the winter of those years, not strong ones.

The other factor we have is the warm blob of water off the coast. In past strong events, this blob did not exist, and it also could be the reason we are currently in a four year drought. If it was not there, it is quite likely at least 2 of the 4 years we would have had average or above average precipitation. So will it affect the strong El Nino, and how? No one knows of course; personally I think it likely it will have some sort of negative effect, but the question is how much.

If we do have a big winter, I will be extremely excited of course. I was not living in California during the last big El Nino. I moved down here in 1999. I am already trying to map out where I will be hiking and what waterfalls I will be visiting this winter. Are you making your list yet? Pictured here is the Lower Middle Fork Tuolumne River Falls, 182 ft. high. Is this going to one of the waterfalls I will be visiting? Perhaps it will, though it is not specifically on my list (but nonetheless, I will be visiting this area for sure next year). If you have not seen it yet yourself, then you will certainly want to put it on your list. It is going to be amazing next year at high flows.

If you are like me, you are watching the weather forecasts with great anticipation. It has been a long winter so far with essentially zero precipitation. Now finally, it is so nice to see the little raindrops on my long range forecast well into the foreseeable future. The latest report, however, looks like we will not see as much rain/snow as hoped for in northern California. Through Sunday, it looks like only about 3 feet of snow in the Tahoe area (more if you live further north, much less for southern CA). These predictions are changing daily, but definitely I was hoping for (and we need) a lot more than this. The good news, though, is that there are more storms throughout next week.

As for my ankle, it is not broken (confirmed by X-ray), but it also has not gotten any better. I do not think I will be able to hike anytime soon, and with waterfall season starting this is BAD, BAD, BAD. Not only this, but we are planning a trip to Disneyland in a few weeks. Disneyland, of course, involves much walking around. I was also hoping to hit up a few waterfalls down there in SoCal. How I am going to manage all this will be a mystery. Maybe my wife can scoot me around in a wheelchair all day (to the waterfalls also!).

I had a request to give a review on my SPOT Connect device. When I first got the device I gave some initial thoughts on it, but now that I have used it for awhile, I can give some more details. I got the SPOT Connect to replace my old SPOT 1 device. SPOT 1 was the company’s first foray into the Emergency beacon world, and although the device worked, it did have its problems. I expected these problems to be resolved with SPOT Connect, but not really. The Connect uses a Bluetooth connection to your iPhone, and a iPhone App controls the device. I did not have any troubles syncing the device with the iPhone via Bluetooth, and the App works perfectly fine. The very first time I attempted to sync the device, it seemed to require a reboot or two of the phone, but since then it works perfect. Sometimes the App will not connect immediately, but all you need to do is close and re-open the App and then it will connect. No issues with that.

The nice thing about SPOT Connect is you can send specific typed messages to your contacts when you are out on the trail (with the old SPOT 1 you can just send a “OK” message). You can either type a message into the App (41 characters), or you can setup pre-defined messages beforehand (of more than 41 characters). It costs extra money to type a message out in the field, so I always try to pre-define them before I go out in the field. It would be nice if you could do this with the app, but you have to do it on your PC at home instead, which is not as convenient. I have set up generic messages for everything I can think of to tell my wife when I will be out on the trails (such as: “OK. I have arrived at waterfall!”). The type-a-message idea I would use for an emergency type situation or when I need to tell my wife something very specific. You can also post the messages to Facebook or Twitter, and you may have seen me do this on my Facebook site. This is a very nice feature.

I think the only real bad thing with the device is that the messages do not always get sent. The SPOT 1 had the same issue but the difference is that the Connect indicates that the message was sent successfully even though it was not (and there is no way to know if it really was sent or not). This is really bad if you are trying to send an important or emergency message. However, this only happens about 10-15 percent of the time so if you send many messages (or the same one multiple times) then most of them will get through.

The other thing about the device is that it will chew up your iPhone battery quickly if you leave it connected. This is obviously a big issue if you are on an extended hike but not so much if you are on a shorter day hike. I always disconnect after sending a message then re-connect when I want to send a second one later. Another thing I have found is that my phone does not work at all when it is extremely cold. It will be important to keep your phone warm if you are hiking in extreme conditions. You can always send an emergency signal directly from the device (without the phone app) but it is nice to be able to send regular OK messages as well.

All in all, I definitely do recommend the device. It is a great peace of mind for myself (hiking alone), and also for my wife (worrying about me, back at home).