WWW - White Winter Wonderland

After the rains came the snows, starting around 7am yesterday. It snowed on and off all day up top with mixed conditions in the village. The snowfalls increased in the evening and then tapered off again until this morning and it's been full-on blizzard conditions since then.

Snow quality was dry but wind packed in places and soon got bouncy as the ungroomed was cut up by the enthusiastic school holiday crowds. I found 20-30cms up high and 10-15cm down low.

Not that I would recommend it but I saw riders on every part of the mountain including the lowest runs under Kosi, Snowgums and Ramshead chairs.

Visibility up high was extremely limited. First it was Karels and Sponars closed due to poor vis and that soon spread to the Basin T-bar. Kosi chair had to be slowed due to the strong winds. The vis was so bad at times that you could not see 3m in front of you on Eagle Way.

Although I was no where near first chair, I still got nice fresh tracks on upper World Cup, Hump Run and the in-run to the bag-jump, which is still to put in an appearance.

Sometime between 10 and 11 this morning there was a power outage to the village and this stopped all lifts for a considerable period. Luckily I had just ordered a hot chocolate at Frostbite Cafe and so sat out the delays in relative comfort.

Interesting clouds on Saturday heralding something ...

First flare run of the season last Saturday night

Bottom of Kosi chair this morning

Every line had tracks on it within the first hour

Bottom of Hump Run above Tower 10

Creamy smooth 15-10cms of fresh on lower slopes

Eagles Nest - top of Kosi chair and the blizzard outside

Frostbite Cafe just before the village power failure

It is still snowing hard and reading the forecasts is exciting - possibly another 50cm or so coming in the next couple of days.

The roads are well truly covered and the snow chains are out and about. Take care.