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Nov
23

It's snowed, how much and where?
Monday November 23, 2009 - Email this article to a friend

There have been reports of dumps in the Pyrenees, Italian Dolomites, The Alps, Scandinavia, Finland, Japan and even New Zealand. It is though warming up now and raining in many resorts.

There have been some pretty heavy snowfalls in The Alps with some high areas doing especially well.

France has received a good covering after missing out on the early season snowfall a few weeks back, though our reporter in Val d'Isere says that it is now raining heavily at resort level washing away much of the snow in town.

On the upper slopes though it is coming down as thick snow.

As we look out of the office window here in Verbier it looks good up top, but there's no snow in town. The freezing level is set to be 2,500m. It is not quite the "mid-winter" conditions that other British ski web sites based in the UK seem to be describing.

Over in Saas-Fee it's been superb lately.

"We've had just under half a metre of fresh snow up here on the glacier and it's been amazing," says PlanetSKI reader, Roddy Willis who is in Saas-Fee. Willis is coaching in the resort and runs the company Alpinemojo.

Our content editor, James Cove, has made his first turns of the season - read about it here in his latest blog.

See the photo below that he took for us this week of someone enjoying the powder.

Not bad for November

Here’s our PlanetSKI snow overview on 12th November 2009 with some help from www.skiinfo.com. The big question though is will IT be as good as last year?

Italy: Last week Cortina reported fresh snow bringing its total up to 1.5m and it's only mid-November. Other parts of Italy including Monterosa in the west are also doing well.

Cervinia has the link to neighbouring Zermatt open which has some excellent high altitude glacier skiing. PlanetSKI was in Zermatt last month making some Autumnal turns.

Austria: Austria is still offering the widest choice of skiing in the Alps. Along with the country’s glacier resorts and some runs are open at the weekend in Kitzbuhel and there is some skiing in Schladming. More skiing will be available in Obergurgle from this weekend.

Obertauern will open shortly, depending on snow conditions - scenes from the Beatles Movie 'Help' were shot here 45 years ago.

Germany: Zugspitz Glacier near Garmisch is their one ski area open with 1.2m snow base.

Verbier this weekSwitzerland: There’s been snow in many parts of Switzerland, so much so that a few runs inVerbier opened last weekend, 2 weeks ahead of schedule. It is only for weekend skiing and we will be out on the slopes this weekend making a video of the conditions, so check back on Monday.

The other resorts open are the main glacier areas of Zermatt and Saas Fee and Les Diablerets (Glacier 3000) which offer the most reliable snow depths for skiing and snowboarding.

Davos/Klosters will be opening limited runs at the weekend and Andermatt to will be partialy open after the snowfall of recent weeks.

France: Great snowfalls in the French Alps and the French Pyrenees. The Pyrenees seems to be doing especially well, and in the last 72 hours Cauterets alone has reported 1.3m of fresh snow. Skiers await for its November 28th opening.

In the Alps there are many unofficial guesstimates of between 50cm to 100cm of snow in resorts like Chamonix and Meribel where skiers and boarder have been walking up to ski down the mountain.

Conditions in Tignes have improved, and it is now possible to ski down to Val Claret.

"This weekend Tignes opens more lifts; the Tichot Chair, and The Leisse," says Stephanie Aillet from the resort. "Last weekend we opened the Double M so it means that we can ski down from the glacier from 3 500 m to 2 100 m in Tignes Val Claret."

France’s highest resort Val Thorens, already has 50cm of snow in the resort and 85cm up the slopes and opens this weekend well ahead of its planned date of 21st November.

The resort will have 10 runs open for skiing and snowboarding on a mix of green, blue and red slopes. A total of 5 lifts will be open on runs at an altitude of 2,300m and 3,000m. We have reported on Val Thorens elsewhere on PlanetSKI.

Andorra: We have had reliable reports that Andorra has had a big snowfall, and snow lies in La Massanna, the main town before the approach to Arinsal, Pal and Arcalis, although we have no depths of snow on the mountain.

Heavy snow in the Grand Valira is shown below and some runs in Soldeu and Pas de la Casa should open at the weekend.

Grand Vallira, Andorra Grand Valira, Andorra

Not too shabby in FormigalSpain: Temperatures have dropped and for the last few days snow has been falling on Formigal, Spain’s largest winter resort. It had record levels of snow in 2008/09 season and already boasts almost 1m at 1,900m and 35cm of snow at 1,500m.

Following 2 days of heavy snow, Baqueira Beret, has reported similar cover with 45cm in resort and 1m at the top of the ski area at 2500m.

Scandinavia:
Finland: All eyes will be on Levi this weekend with the next stage of the World Cup circuit taking place. Other resorts in Finland include Ruka with respectable snow levels.

Sweden: Vemdalen and Klövsjö/Storhogna received between 20-30cm of fresh snow. The weather report looks promising for the rest of the week, with temperatures below zero. Vemdalen plans to open on Saturday. Äre, Funäsdalen and Tänndalen are already open and received aproximately 5cm of new snow.

This week both the US and the Swedish Alpine Ski teams have been training on Tärnaby in preparation for the World Cup event in Levi. As we have reported elsewhere Bode Miller is due to make his long-awaited comeback - should be quite a weekend.

Norway: Ski areas open in Norway are also in to double figures with Hemsedal reporting over 30cm of new powder to delight early skiers and boarders.

Opening day in Hemsedal

Japan: Great snowfalls in Japan with Niseko just days away from opening on November 20th. October 30th saw Niseko’s first major dump at 200m resort village level, and more is forecast.

USA: Resorts are now opening daily across North America and its probably at this point that it becomes increasingly difficult to keep track of activities and openings. Many have had more than 60cm of fresh snow during the week and it is expected most US ski resorts will be open in time for Thanksgiving.

Colorado: The number of areas open looks set to reach double figures by the weekend. Keystone and Copper mountain opened early last month with Arapahoe Basin and Loveland.

Other Western US Resorts: Crystal Mountain and Mt Baker in Washington state will be open soon.

East US: Killington in Vermont and Bretton Woods in New Hampshire opened last weekend, joining Sunday River in Maine. More areas plan to open in the next few days including Belleayre in New York State.

Canada: More resorts have been opening in Alberta and British Columbia. The big news is that Whistler is opening and we have a full report on that here.

Lake Louise opened last Friday, joining Banff area Mt Norquay. Marmot Basin and Sunshine will open in the next few days. This week Banff area reported 63cm of new snow. Marmot Basin boasts a new quad chairlift.

Naskia another resort in Alberta close to Clagary has only been open to race teams but now opens to the public this weekend, and it too boast a new quad chair.
Lake Louise is preparing for its World Cup races later this month. The Men’s races take place on November 28 to 29; Women’s races on December 4 to 6.
Sunshine Village with approx 1.30m of snow to date opens on November 11. Half of its 107 runs will be accessible, with Standish, Wawa and Strawberry lifts set to open.

British Columbia: Sun Peaks also plans to open in the next few days a week earlier than planned.

Australasia
New Zealand: Its been a long season in New Zealand and the last ski areas closed at the weekend. Turoa on Mt Ruapehu still had more than 2m of snow lying on closing day.

“Both Turoa and Whakapapa have done well this year with plenty of fine weather weekends and fresh spring snowfalls which helped extend the season at Turoa for the second year in a row. We'd like to thank everyone who visited us for their support throughout the 2009 winter season, particularly during Snovember. It's great to have the opportunity to offer another three weeks worth of skiing and riding but we couldn't do it without our wonderful customers.” commented a ski area statement.