Mammoth Lakes received its first snow of the season, getting blanketed overnight Saturday. Residents awoke to the first day of fall Sunday to find 4 to 6 inches on top, 2 to 3 inches at Main Lodge and about an inch at Canyon.

This all comes with fewer than 50 days until Mammoth’s Nov. 7 opening of ski season.

Opening weekend at Mammoth will feature live music, park contests and a movie. The focal point in the Village will  be the Underground Lounge, which is new for this year and will have a SoCal vibe with an alpine twist.

June Mountain, the family-friendly resort just minutes north, is reopening Dec. 13 after being closed last season. June’s slightly lower elevation means a later opening date, spokesman Tim LeRoy said Monday. Note that kids will ski free at June all season.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has called for average temps and snow totals this winter for most areas of the nation.

Follow us on Twitter @latimestravel

Like us on Facebook

chris....

Success has finally caught up with Universal's Horror Nights as the gold standard of Halloween theme park events has grown too predictable, complacent and popular for its own good.

After years of defining and redefining the bleeding edge of theme park terror, a combination of overwhelming crowds, shrinking space due to construction and a weak collection of haunted mazes delivered a triple whammy to Halloween Horror Nights this year at Universal Studios Hollywood.

Crowds have become an increasing problem as Horror Nights has grown in popularity, but this year was unbearable. During my opening weekend visit, queues outside some mazes stretched to 2 1/2 hours at their peak. Inside the mazes that translated to a conga line of people that frequently ground to a halt, virtually killing every opportunity for any scares.

Construction on Despicable Me: Minion Mayhem (opening in spring 2014) and the Wizarding World of Harry...

Motel 6 in downtown Oceanside, Calif., marks the seaside town's 125th anniversary with an apt promotion: Stay two nights and pay $125 plus tax for both nights. That's a good deal for any coastal stay, and a good time of year to go as summer winds down and beaches clear out.

The deal: The budget Motel 6 Oceanside is located at 909 N. Coast Highway. It features newer-style rooms at this motel chain, and the building is smoke-free. The offer is available by phone reservation only; ask for the  "Oceanside 125" rate when booking. Check out VisitOceanside's website for ideas on self-guided walking tours.

When: The offer is good through Dec. 31, subject to availability.

Tested: I phoned and asked about the Oceanside 125 deal and found availability for Oct. 11 to 13. The cost of a room on the same nights usually starts at $75.99 plus tax. Make sure you call the downtown site when you're making a reservation; there's more than one Motel 6 in and around Oceanside.

Info: Motel 6 Downtown...

My Top 13 list of Halloween mazes at theme parks around the world gathers together the most demented, disturbing and disgusting haunted attractions in one virtual place.

Photos: Top 13 theme park haunted mazes in the world

Think of the Top 13 as my version of a dream vacation if I had a bottomless budget and unlimited vacation time to jet around the globe to the best and most bizarre haunts.

I've tried to include a sampling of mazes from each of the major theme park chains plus a few independents.

I purposely left out any entries from Six Flags' Fright Fest and Cedar Fair's Halloween Haunt because I find those events interchangeable and unimaginative with a conga line of identical sexy vampire, killer clown and murderous butcher mazes.

Universal Studios, the undisputed leader in horror this time of year, is the most well represented on the list and probably deserves a Top 13 of its own.

And there's even an entry from Disney, a company better known for family-friendly fare than spine-...

Think of the Mobile Meditator as cushioning your journey. Besides its use in meditation, it works great as a backrest or pillow.

The sueded plastic pillow from BriteSpot Solutions has three independent inflatable chambers, which rise at a higher angle at the back than at the front. Adjust the center chamber for spine support and pelvic tilt and the two sides for hip and thigh support. (Your back and head can benefit from these adjustable angles as well.)

You can blow up each chamber by blowing into it as you would with any inflatable. To prevent unwanted deflation, the chambers won’t inflate or deflate unless the valve neck is squeezed at the same time, which can require extra effort and breath.

The company offers an optional basic plastic hand pump, but a bicycle pump will do. The pillow is available in six colors, weighs less than a pound, and comes with a matching pouch. Mobile Meditator cushion costs $29.95; optional pump is $1.99.

Info: www.mobilemeditator.com.

Follow us on...

If you want to improve your vacation photos, read on, but we give a hall pass to the readers who submitted photos for the Travel section's annual "What I Did on My Summer Vacation." They can stop reading here because they’ve obviously mastered photo basics — and beyond.

In fact, they made it difficult to whittle down the 1,500 submissions to something manageable, which you’ll see in the Sunday print Travel section and online.

These days, with cellphone cameras, everybody is a photographer. Many of the photos were taken with phone cameras (mostly iPhones), which put the power in everyone’s hands.

But, like all power, this one can be misused. I know. I do it all the time. My middle name is not “Visual Intelligence.”

So I asked my photo guru — Richard Derk, the travel photo editor for the L.A. Times for many years — to share some of his tips for taking better pictures, for being prepared and for getting yourself out of a jam, if need be....