Bay Area rain is good start to winter, but forecasts show another dry season for CA

SAN RAMON, Calif. (KGO) -- The Bay Area got soaked with a good amount of rain Saturday, with a steady rainfall for much of the day.

Rennie Christian and Renee Collins didn't let the heavy rain stop them from getting the family Christmas tree.

"It is not going to stop us from getting this done. It is tradition," Christian said.

The family is one of the few, who despite the rain, still made it out to Moore Christmas Trees lot in San Ramon.

MORE: LIVE: Track rain in San Francisco Bay Area with Live Doppler 7

"It is the time of the year to grab a tree. If it is raining, snowing, hailing, it's whenever you want to get something," said Jake Allen, who works at the tree lot.

Some parts of the Bay Area will a get up to an inch and a half of rain this weekend. Saturday is expected to be the wettest day, with rainfall through Monday. The rain also means snow for Lake Tahoe.

"It is good. We are anticipating it. We are very excited for it. It is great to see lake level rain, lake level snow," said Kevin "Coop" Cooper, a Tahoe area travel expert.

He says over the past few years, the region has been getting about 100 inches below the average snowfall for the area. That's why he's excited about this weekend's rain, which could bring up to two feet of snow.

MORE: Timeline: More Bay Area rain, Sierra snow this weekend

"Any type of precipitation now, as we have been in a drought for so long, over a decade, any (precipitation) is good. But this actually feels like a normal winter," Cooper said.

Climate experts like Andrew Schwartz with UC Berkeley's Central Sierra Snow Laboratory says a strong storm this early in the season is a good start. But longer-term forecasts for California show another dry winter.

"We need about an extra year's worth of precipitation to come out of the drought. So I guess a successful season this year, if we want to come out of the drought, would be 60 feet of snow. I think that might be a little optimistic though," said Schwartz, adding that he estimates that's only happened once or twice in the past 150 years.

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