North America Snow Wrap CHRISTMAS WEEK
Nice turns at Jackson Hole 17 December. Image:: Jackson Hole
Weekly Snow Wrap
Weekend snowfalls, top 5 in North America: 1 – Alyeska, Alaska (again) with 111cm, 2 – Woodbury, Connecticut, Bear Mountain, California, Snow Summit, California and Mt Norquay, Alberta all with 40cm, 3 – Mt Baldy, California, Sunrise Park, Arizona and Sandia Peak, New Mexico with 35cm, 4 – Eaglecrest, Alaska with 33cm and 5 – Angelfire, New Mexico with 30cm
On the forecast:
Nearly 50cm is heading towards Whistler in the next week, 20cm or so in the North West of the USA and scatterings of not much more than 10cm in Colorado.
Highlights this week:
CHRISTMAS! Of course, plus Whistler’s impending snow.
If we could pick anywhere this week, we’d be: Whistler, with that storm heading towards it there should be some freshies there!
Deer Valley looking delightful, 20 December. Image:: Deer Valley
British Columbia
Status: Open! And most resorts have most trails open too!
Recent snow: Light snow over the weekend – 20cm at Kicking Horse was the top measurement, most other resorts received more like 10cm.
Coming snow: 45cm on the cards for Whistler – mostly over next weekend. Light snow all through the week everywhere else. Perhaps 8cm at Silver Star, about the same at Big White, a little more for Fernie.
Conditions generally: Packed powder and some powder.
Alberta
Status: Open! and operating at about 80%
Recent snow: 20cm, perhaps a little less, over the weekend, with Mt Norquay scoring a nice 40cm
Coming snow: Light snow every day this week but nothing that could be called a ‘storm’.
Conditions generally: Nice dry, cold cover being regularly topped up by light snowfall – lovely!
Canada East Coast
Status: Slowly slowly the East Coast resorts are opening and getting their trails going. Those resorts that are open – Tremblant, Mont-Sainte-Anne, Mont Sutton for example – have a bit under half their mountains operating.
Recent snow: 20cm for Stoneham and Mont-Saint-Anne over the weekend, not much anywhere else.
Coming snow: Again, not much forecast for the next five days.
Conditions generally: Still early season.
Pipe perfection at Buttermilk. Image:: Aspen
California
Status: Heaps of resorts open now, though a few smaller resorts are still closed and those that are open have perhaps 15% – 30% of their trails open.
Recent snow: A real contract between places like Bear Mountain and Snow Summit which scored 40cm on the weekend! And everywhere else where it’s been a pretty much dry December.
Coming snow: Oh sad, clear skies until 2012…
Conditions generally: Well it’s been cold so lots of snow has been made, but off the snowmaking areas it’s pretty much not worth mentioning.
Colorado
Status: Every resort open, bar two! Aspen has 54% of trails open, Steamboat 30%, Crested Butte 57% – all the resorts are somewhere around there.
Recent snow: There really hasn’t been any snow in Colorado recently – nothing more than about 3cm at Loveland and 5cm at Crested Butte.
Coming snow: Hopefully about 7cm before the weekend in the northern part of the state.
Conditions generally: It’s good skiing while still being early season.
Holiday fireworks at Mammoth 17 December. Image:: Mammoth
Utah
Status: Most everywhere is open in Utah but the number of trails open varies greatly, from nearly 70% at Solitude to only 8% at Canyons.
Recent snow: No snow over the weekend but there was a little bit of fresh last week!
Coming snow: 2cm on Wednesday but then sunny until next week.
Conditions generally: Parts of Utah are quite great, other parts – well the groomers are the way to go!
North West – Wyoming, Idaho, Montana
Status: Most of Wyoming and Montana are open and about half of Idaho. Anywhere from half to a quarter of the trails are open at the resorts.
Recent snow: It snowed about 6cm in Montana over the weekend, but that’s about it.
Coming snow: Nope, not much. 2cm for Whitefish in Montana, that’s about it.
Conditions generally: Without much recent snow, the conditions are hard packed powder.
