Hi
@DRG! Welcome to the site and to SF
I think
@santacruz skier and I are the only Northern California active Divas right now, but maybe more will pop up.
Have you decided on North Lake or South Lake? Are you going to get a pass? I get the Epic Local + The Mountain Collective to cover Tahoe and a couple of side trips. I think the Epic is only available for a few more weeks, but I could be wrong. I ski mostly South Lake (Kirkwood & Heavenly) with the occasional trip to North Lake. Both have their pros and cons and attract vastly different crowds. I haven't made it to any of the smaller places like Rose, Sierra, etc., but they are definitely on my list. Each mountain can also get hit by the same storm in crazy different ways. For years (not the last few obviously) Kirkwood was up there in terms of most snowfall per year.
I work in the City but live in the South Bay, so getting to Tahoe is not the easiest process for me, but we do it almost every weekend. Do you have a car? Last year I looked into the
Bay Area Ski Bus for trips when my SO was out of town and I didn't want to drive. Seems like a pretty good deal. Have you considered doing a ski lease? I had never heard of them till I moved out here, but it seems to be a thing. We did one with some friends last year, but you can also get in with some strangers for cheap if you want.
SnowPals is the big one, and you can also search Craigslist for people looking for more members of their ski lease.
As you mentioned, despite our location, it's pretty easy to get out of town and chase some snow. Flights to Denver and SLC can be had for cheap and there are usually a few flights late enough in the day that you can work most of a full day on Friday and fly out after work. We usually wait to book these trips until we're 80% sure a storm rolling in (i.e., book flight on Wednesday, leave on Friday). I've also flown back super early Monday or Tuesday and gotten in a half day at work. United added a direct to Jackson last year, though I haven't taken it yet. Vancouver also has tons of flights, but beware the glacial pace of SFO's international terminal...go early
Anyways, I could ramble on all day! Let me know if you/need want any other intel on shops or traffic or whatever. Hopefully we will have snow by Thanksgiving this year!!