Fun -- if you get the drift

The giant snowstorm that buried Big Bear Lake over the weekend seemed gentle and reassuring compared with the smoke, fire and evacuations the mountain resort has endured. Mother Nature, for now, acting motherly.

In fact, despite slick roads, cars entombed by snow and freezing temperatures, it was pretty much impossible to find anyone willing to utter an unkind word about the weather.

“That’s not snow, that’s white gold,” cracked John Litton, 57, from his perch at Chad’s Place, a local saloon regulars describe as “the safest place in town” during a blizzard. “Yes, it’s a big storm, but it’s a big storm only if you’re not used to it.”

After the devastating wildfires of October laid waste to much of the parched San Bernardino Mountains, people here say they can’t get enough snow. It is, they say, preferable to rain, with its accompanying floods, rock and mudslides. And it brings in something that’s been missing for a while: tourists.

“It’s been since 2005 since we have had a good snow; this is a godsend,” said Dawn Crawford, manager of the Village Spa in Big Bear Village.

“Our business was closed two weeks during the fire. We hugely depend on tourists. There is no downside to snow.”

Big Bear was a vision of white Monday, with enormous clouds dipping low over the lake and creating a corridor of fog that lent a dreamlike quality to the frozen landscape.

The entire mountain range was drenched in white, which proved a powerful lure for flatlanders seeking fun on the slopes or simply itching to play in the snow.

Cars heading to Big Bear and other resorts were required to don chains well before getting to their destinations. Orange- and yellow-clad chain jockeys did a brisk business in turnouts, charging motorists between $30 and $40 per installation.

Some of the less committed, or the less equipped, turned around at that point and parked along the road. By 11 a.m., fields of stubby snowmen began appearing up and down California 38.

Noah Ybarra, 5, desperately tried to jam two spindly twigs into the frozen shoulders of his Hobbit-sized snowman.

“They’ve seen snow before, but not like this,” said his father, Charles, who had brought his family from Whittier for a winter romp. “I can’t wait to get them on the ski slopes.”

Nearby, Mike Haig of Highland was watching his 2-year-old son Kadin stumble and fall about in snow up to his waist. Not long ago, his family was packed up to evacuate when flames from the mountains came dangerously close to their home.

“It was really scary then, but this is a relief,” he said.

Those who managed to get farther up the highway were rewarded with sparsely populated ski slopes. The crowds aren’t expected until later.

Business at Big Bear Mountain Trading Co. was slow Monday, but Jay Tait expects that to change over the weekend, when skiers and snowboarders come charging up the hill.

“We’ll get families during the day who are up here to play in the snow,” Tait said.

“And the skiers hit us after the slopes close.”

The store has sold “a little bit of everything” for 28 years, Tait said. He and his wife took over the business last fall, just as wildfires were ripping through other mountain regions.

“It was worrisome,” he said of his fiery debut. “But the resort association and Chamber of Commerce has done a pretty good job of letting people know that despite the fires, the town and the rest of the mountain is in pretty good shape.”

At Robinhood Resort, Charles Brewster said that the fires that swept Lake Arrowhead, Running Springs and Green Valley Lake, along with a weak economy, helped keep tourists away.

When pocketbooks get tight, one of the first things to go is mountain vacations, he said.

“It’s been tough on a lot of people up here,” he said.

His 60-room hotel filled up for the Christmas holidays, but business was slacking off until the storms hit this weekend.

“The phone’s been ringing off the hook,” Brewster said. “I’ve taken 25 calls this morning.”

The fires of October never reached Big Bear, but roads to the city were closed and businesses suffered major losses.

“A lot of the reporting about the fires frightened people away,” said Richard Millener, 55, as he shoveled the roof of his business, Millener Productions Old Time Photos.

Shoveling rooftops isn’t so strange here. The alternative is to have water leak into your home or business.

“I wonder what corporation thought it was a good idea to make flat roofs in a place that snows?” said Millener, who specializes in taking portraits of people in period costume.

“I personally like the snow, but it depends on who you are. If you’re an old lady, it’s a pain to walk down the street, but if you’re a young snowboarder it’s great.”

Living in a winter wonderland is old hat to grizzled locals, but it was magical to Guatemalans Sandra Cabrera, 49, and her son, Juan Pablo Cabrera, 24.

They were visiting Santa Monica, and when the storm hit they rushed to Big Bear for their first glimpse of snow.

“It’s amazing. It’s gorgeous. We have never seen anything so white before,” said Juan Pablo before diving into a drift.

His mother eagerly snapped photos.

“Yesterday we felt all the snow on our face and it was so cold, but I like it cold,” she said in Spanish. “I think this is just wonderful.”

--

david.kelly@latimes.com

catherine.saillant@latimes.com