Treacherous trek to Tahoe, slick roads and multiple spinouts

Treacherous conditions en route to Tahoe

The first great snowfall of the season proved to be a beautiful winter wonderland for those lucky enough to stay indoors by the fire. But anyone driving up to the Tahoe area on Saturday faced treacherous driving conditions with multiple spinouts reported up in the Northern California mountains.

On Saturday afternoon, the California Highway Patrol said that they weren't let any traffic through on Interstate 80 between Truckee and the Nevada state line because of the multitude of car crashes. Later in the day, the CHP said the conditions at Donner Summit were "deteriorating" even further.

Fortunately, none of the spinouts were major, the CHP reported.

Skip Brown was able to make it to a ski resort by taking it slow and driving on frontage roads.

He was happy for the snow.

"We need it," he said.

As of early Sunday morning, Caltrans was mandating that anyone who wanted to traverse through Highways 50 and Interstate 80 on the way to the ski resorts had to put chains on their tires.

The storms were affecting Placer, El Dorado and Nevada counties, among others.

The National Weather Service said that as of late Saturday night, the snow had stopped falling, but the roads were still icy.

Temperatures dropped into the single digits in South Lake Tahoe and below zero in Truckee.

The rest of the country saw winter storms as well on Saturday, including the northeastern states. Florida even had tornadoes.