What a winter! And spring! Today's snowfall doesn't go down as Portland's latest, that honor goes to downtown Portland in 1933:

The latest BIG snowfall was no joke, it happened on April Fools Day also in downtown Portland:

But here are some of the snow totals from around the area from March 28, topped by Buxton in the Coast Range:

Perhaps even more incredible is what is happening in the Cascades. Mt Hood Meadows Ski Resort set a new ALL TIME season snowfall record on Friday:

What's interesting about this is the old record was set during the MASSIVE El Nino of 1982-83. If you're thinking" "Now wait a minute, El Nino's usually bring warm dry winters to the Northwest!", you're right. Usually, they do. But the 1982-83 El Nino was SO strong, it kept the entire West Coast under the storm gun all winter. Remember the homes in Mailbu, CA sliding off cliffs into the ocean?

So the El Nino record has been surpassed by a La Nina year, appropiately enough. We expect a lot of mountain snow in La Nina years like this. I was living in Salt Lake City in 1982-83, enjoying record snowfall and great powder days at Alta Ski Area in the Wasatch Mountains. But I'd venture to guess that this year, the skiing in the Northwest has been better than it was in 1982-83, because we've had so many days with low elevation snow. That means the snow at the ski areas is colder, drier and fluffier, which makes for better skiing.

And the Cascades get more snow this weekend. The hits just keep on coming.

Feel free to post YOUR snow totals and observations of our wild weather here. Love to hear about them!

Matt Zaffino
KGW Chief Meteorologist