STORY AND PHOTOS BY KAREN BOSSICK

“Why did they ever call this Sun Valley?” asked the gentleman as he stepped into classic Nordic skis at Sun Valley Nordic Center.

“All it ever does is snow here,” the man continued. “We went to Prairie Creek yesterday and found blue sky and sun. It was like being on another planet!”

After an instant winter, thanks to two feet of snow over three days in early December, Sun Valley has continued to resemble a scene out of a Norman Rockwell painting with a few inches continuing to fall here and there.

It’s made for great skiing on Baldy, where skiers are even skiing the new glades opened up by tree trimming as workers removed diseased trees.

It’s put a smile on those at Sun Valley Nordic Center, which broke in new grooming apparatus this week.

And it’s certainly improved the snowpack in an area that has long been beset by drought.

The snowpack Christmas morning was 131 percent of average in the Big Wood Basin as the snow continued to fall. It was 144 percent of average in the Big Lost drainage and 142 percent in the Little Wood Basin.

And, while Sun Valley hasn’t had any uber dumps this week, that’s okay. It beats the rain and power outages that have plagued Tahoe ski resorts over the holiday weekend. And Sun Valley skiers fortunately did not have the experience of 167 skiers at Deer Valley, who were stranded for several hours when the Carpenter Express chairlift broke down.

Whoops....what did we say about no uber dumps? At least 16 inches fell Saturday afternoon and early Sunday morning in "Sun" Valley. And it's still snowing.

The local snowpack now sits at 142 percent of average, while the Little Wood Basin and Lost River Basin are about 155 percent.

And, dang, get the down out….looks like the cold is headed our way with overnight lows of minus-4 on Monday.