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Jan
15

Enjoying the snow
Sunday January 15, 2012 - Email this article to a friend

The storms of earlier have passed and people are enjoying the great snow around The Alps. Much is already tracked out off piste but the piste skiing is superb. High winds have had a huge impact on the snow conditions as you can see in the PlanetSKI snow report that comes from The Austrian Alps.

Here in The Tirol it has been pretty good with clear blue sky overhead this weekend.

In Obergurgl there was a dusting of snow on Friday morning as the temperature dropped again.

The wind came in again though closing many lifts.

For Saturday and Sunday it was superb.

Hard, fast piste skiing and few crowds around.

Much of the fresh snow has been blown off the piste but with some local knowledge it is still possible to find fresh tracks.

Powder in Obergurgl, Sunday15th

In places the pistes are icy but that actually suited out content editor, James Cove, who is in the Austrian resort.

He was skiing with members of the US women ski team including a potential new star; 16-year old Mikaela Shiffrin who is already being compared to Lindsey Vonn after she made the podium in a World Cup race.

She came 3rd last December in Lienz in Austria.

The youngest US skier to make the podium for 30 years or so.

All smiles

We will bring you a Chairlift Chat video interview with Mikaela Shiffrin later and some video of her skiing as James Cove tried to keep up!

For a related PlanetSKI story on skiing with the US Ski team see here.

And just in case you are wondering what the main headline photo is above it is sundown at the Top Star Mountain bar at 3,080m.

James skied down as night fell with the route illuminate by a piste basher he and his group had arranged to light the way.

"I have done a few things round the mountains but skiing down in dark with a piste basher lighting the way was one of the more unusual. I loved it!," he said.

Anyway on with the PlanetSKI snowreport............

The snow is good across other parts of Austria.

The snow has come at a cost with resorts cut off for a while and a huge effort has gone on in the past few weeks to keep things running.

Clearing up last week

It was nothing like as bad as some sections of the British press portrayed with scare stories about resorts cuts off and avalanches threatening, but it was a massive snowfall and it did cause huge problems.

Ischgl, Austria

Now though we have had some of the best, if not the best conditions, of the winter. Especially here in Austria.

It is the same across The Alps.

PlanetSKI reporter, Jane Peel, has been in Tignes and will be posting a piece soon on the work done to keep things open as she spends a day with the avalanche patrol.

In the meantime she has been skiing in the nearby resort of Sainte Foy.

"It's been blue skies and sunshine all week. This picture below was taken on the empty, beautifully groomed pistes of Sainte Foy, just a few kilometres down the mountain from Tignes. The snow conditions and lack of crowds made for some excellent fast carving practice for both skiers and boarders," she said.

Solitude in St Foy

However by Sunday people in Espace Killy already want more.

"The weather here continues to be cold, clear and sunny. There has barely been a cloud in the sky for a week now. Despite the massive snow storm at the start of January, everyone here is now hoping more snow will fall soon to provide some fresh tracks off piste," said Jane Peel on Sunday evening.

"So much of what there is off piste is wind blown. Even some of the areas which had sufficient snow this time last year (when conditions weren't great) are off limits, with rocks exposed. For fans of on piste skiing, conditions remain good, although some pistes are hard and the cool temperatures mean they don't soften much in the course of the day."

By and large the weather is lifting giving some clear sky at last.

Serfaus, Austria

The avalanche danger has actually been remarkably small considering the amounts of snow and the high winds.

Overall it is surprisingly stable though of course extreme danger does exist off piste and everyone should check local conditions before heading into the backcountry.

As the temperature warmed up there was a wet snow avalanche in France that went across the piste. See a video of it here.

In Chamonix skiers are on the Vallee Blanche including a group that was with Robbie Fenlon, a mountian guide used by one of our partners at PlanetSKI, BASS Chamonix.

"We skied the Vallee Blanche today Jan 13th.The access arete is well equiped. Although there are some crevasses the route passes easily through the Salle a manger. The exit from the glacier is easy and the the forest track is easily skiable to the carpark in Chamonix.All in all it is the safest i have seen it in many years. Very skiable for our clients," said Robbie Fenlon.

For some the hard bit For some the hard part

For all the good part

For a round up of the snow in Europe and North America, where there has finally been some in the USA, read on.......

FRANCE: The storm lifted earlier in the week and many resorts have been enjoying great conditions.

It made a change from the New Year week.

Espace Killy claims 2m on the top runs and 1.3 on the lower ones.

Last week out content editor, James Cove, was in Tignes in France as the storm started.

St Gervais

Morzine, Portes du Soleil

AUSTRIA:The snow finally stopped and the sun came out in places on Thursday 12^th.

And it was very welcome though there has been some good skiing since the storm eased at the beginning of the week.

Ischgl was the centre of the media's attention as we have mentioned above and now it has 2m at the top and 1m on the lower slopes.

"The skiing conditions are fantastic, although obviously no one is going off-piste at the moment because of the amount of snow. It has been very windy at the top of the mountain which means visibility can be affected by wind-blown snow - but the holidaymakers are having a wonderful time," said the British ski instructor Sarah Hannibal, who works in Ischgl.

Sarah added: "Many ski instructors who live in other parts of the valley are the ones affected most by the conditions and they have had to make arrangements to stay with friends or at hotels in Ischgl. That includes me - I live in Galtur and have been stranded in Ischgl - but it's no hardship when the skiing is so good. And having this amount of snow at this stage of the winter means that everyone can look forward to a fabulous season."

At the top of St Anton it is claimed to be 6m though the snow pack is stabilising as the snow settles and the temperature warms up.

Pretty much everywhere in Austria has good snow.

Ischgl, Austria

Stubai glacier

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SWITZERLAND: It has been in similar picture in neighbouring Switzerland.

One of our favourite resorts, Crans-Montana has a staggering 3.7m at the top and 1.5 on the lower slopes. The resort is mainly south facing so suffers when there is little snow.

Not at the moment though and if you can get there then do, is our advice.

We are traveling around The Alps at the moment so haven't been in our base resort of Verbier for a while but friends tell us that the snow is plentiful and the slopes reasonably empty.

However the recent storms led to many trees collapsing under the weight of snow.

Fallen by weight of snow Brought down by weight of snow

flag_italy ITALY:The Aosta Valley seems to be one of the best places to be in Italy with some good fresh snow.

Pila and La Thuile has great skiing on all its runs and there are few people around as we can see from the picture below from the Facebook page of the Aosta Valley.

The better-known resorts of Courmayeur and Cervinia also have good conditions.

Pila, Aosta Valley

Over in the Milky Way Sauze d'Oulx has 1m on the upper runs and it is a similar scene in neighbouring Sestriere.

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ANDORRA:Sadly it is not so good over in the Pyrenees but at least the sun is out.

Efforts are being made overnight to make snow but it melts pretty quickly during the day according to a couple of readers in The Principality.

Quite a few lifts are closed.

Arinsal has just 20cm on the lower slopes and 40cm on the upper runs.

As often the best conditions are to be found in the high and north facing resort of Arcalis.

flag_-_scotland_01 SCOTLAND: The mild weather in the UK has played havoc with the snow in Scotland.

Glenshee closed as the snow melted while The Nevis Range and Cairngorm have remained open though the snow is not great.

It is set to get colder next week though so fingers crossed.

Last month the Scottish Snowpsorts Festival took place on Princess Street in Edinburgh with 50 tons of snow brought in - we reported on it here.

For a video of the event, that has just been released, see below.

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NORWAY: Roldal and Voss in Norway, have reported 1.2m of snow in the past seven days.

Voss has 2.5 on the upper runs and there was some more snow in many of the country's resorts earlier in the week.

USA: At last! It has been a dismal few weeks and one of the worst starts to the season in recent memory in many places.

However some snow has finally fallen as we reported in this earlier story on PlanetSKI. In Alaska there has been over 5m.

They could do with some of it further south.

Winter Park in Colorado had a reported 10cm of fresh flakes and now claims 90cm on its lower slopes and 1m on the upper ones.

The picture below comes from Snowbird in Utah.

Powder at last

There has been a bit of snow at the Canyons too.

"Even though the natural snowfall hasn't been abundant of late, our snowmaking and grooming crews have been hard at work resulting in great conditions," said a spokesman form the resort.

For a video of what it is like see below.