CALIFORNIA ALBUM : Winter Vacation Is Over in Sierras : The extended drought gave newcomers a holiday from the mountain region’s frigid climate. But four weeks of relentless snow and ice have changed all that.

Seven years ago, at the dawn of California’s drought, Tom Macango left Hawaii and bought a spectacular log house in the wooded Sierras. Its perch atop a steep, 135-foot-long driveway seemed ideal at the time--secluded, with enough elevation for a view.

Macango is now thigh-deep in snow, weathering Truckee’s fiercest winter in a decade. He still loves his house but he has grown considerably less fond of the driveway.

“I’m out here with my snow blower five, six times a day and it still keeps piling up,” Macango said, flushed and winded after yet another duel with the drifts. “I don’t want to complain, because California certainly needs a winter like this. But staying on top of this stuff can really wear you out.”

It has been snowing almost without pause here for four weeks, and the people of this historic mill town--lulled by a string of uncommonly dry years--are a little bit overwhelmed.

Those who settled in Truckee during the drought are discovering with horror the hassles of impassable roads and supermarkets that have been stripped of staples. Those who lived here before knew a “real winter” would come again, but forgot just how tough it can be to cope.

All over town, the streets are smothered by mountains of plowed snow, some rising two stories high. Road crews run their plows 24 hours a day, but residents in some neighborhoods have found themselves snowbound--forced to strap on snowshoes or skis to reach jobs and get food.

Dismayed by such hardships, some Truckee newcomers already have concluded that mountain life is not for them. Real estate brokers--who cashed in on a growth spurt that nearly doubled the town’s population in the past 10 years--say a flurry of home sales is likely this spring.

“After while the mild weather sort of became normal and I think a lot of us got used to it,” said Peggy Boelk, a 14-year resident who works in a downtown hardware store. “The fact is, this is what winter in the mountains is all about. We’ve just had a long vacation.”

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Nestled in a valley 14 miles from Lake Tahoe, Truckee officially began life as a stage stop in 1863. The railroad came next, along with logging and a Wild West ambience complete with brothels and gunfights in the streets.

Until its renaissance began in the late 1960s, the town remained a gritty place, dominated by bawdy saloons, packs of stray dogs and boarded up storefronts. The last of 14 lumber mills finally closed in 1989, and Truckee depends on tourists to survive.

Visitors can enjoy a gourmet French supper, shop at factory outlet stores and buy chocolate truffles or pricey hand-knit sweaters from Chile.

Given its 6,000-foot elevation, Truckee has endured many dramatic winters--episodes the old-timers love to recount for “flatlanders” or anyone else who will sit and listen for an hour.

The most notorious, of course, was the blizzards of 1846, which enveloped the ill-fated Donner Party west of town. Another whopper was the winter of 1952, when the snowfall on Donner Summit measured 65 feet and trapped a trainload of people for three days. The trans-Sierra highway was closed for a month that year.

As for this winter, so far it is distinctive in two ways, residents say: The storms started early and they haven’t let up. Indeed, so much snow has piled up in the streets that crews are forced to truck it out of town.

“It’s just been nonstop, and it’s so cold that none of it is melting,” said Chamber of Commerce Director Michele Franke, whose office parking lot has been shrunk from 20 spaces to four by the expanding powder mounds. “The skiing is really fantastic. But in town there is a level of agitation that seems to be pretty high.”

Eric Shafer knows this to be true. As director of local road maintenance, he has the impossible task of keeping 140 miles of pavement plowed despite the ever-falling flakes. When agitated homeowners cannot get out, many of them telephone Shafer, whose complaint line fields hundreds of calls a day. Others are more direct.

“Some people throw shovels at us and cuss and chase the plows, but there’s not much we can do,” said Shafer, who has worked 15-hour days for three weeks with no break. “It’s man and machine against Mother Nature, and no matter how hard you work, you wind up on the losing end.”

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Storm-induced stress is nothing new in the mountains, but it has been intensified, Shafer and others say, by the growth Truckee has experienced since the last serious snow year. In the winter of 1982-83, about 6,000 people lived here; now there are nearly 11,000. That means more roads to clear--and about 5,000 newcomers who may be experiencing a true Truckee winter for the first time.

“A lot of these newcomers had no idea what they were signing up for,” said Dick Howell, who owns OB’s Pub and Restaurant in downtown Truckee. “They bought two-wheel-drive cars and got jobs down in Reno and suddenly they can’t go three feet. This is a real dose of reality for them.”

Signs of Truckee’s population boom abound. The community has traffic, crowded schools and a full lineup of fast-food restaurants. In November, concerns about growth prompted residents to approve the incorporation of their town.

Stefanie Orozco, a lifelong resident, is among those who believe Truckee has experienced too much growth, too fast. That is one reason she smiled at the snow swirling past the window of her clothing store one recent afternoon.

“This kind of winter will really thin out the town,” Orozco said. “You watch: In spring the (for sale) signs will go up and they’ll all take off for lower ground.”

Shafer, for one, suspects the exodus has already begun: “It may be a coincidence,” he said after a shift with his plow, “but lately I’ve seen a lot of moving vans running around this town.”

Meanwhile, Truckee’s most seasoned winter survivors remain calm. They know that the way you get through storms like this is to be patient, gear down the pace of life and swap stories of winter’s toll. Bartender Robert McBeath has a doozy.

“My neighbor parked her car at the end of her driveway and it got shredded by one of the (county’s mammoth) snow blowers,” he said. “She was pretty upset, so she called the sheriff to complain, and they came out and gave her a $130 ticket for blocking the road.”

Another anecdote making the rounds tells the saga of a man who lost his dog in the blizzard. For 11 frantic days he hunted for his pet, posting signs and offering rewards. Finally, he found the pooch buried beneath his snow-covered front porch--safe, but slightly underweight.