There's something of a history developing of April Fools involving indoor snow centres.
A few years ago a Scottish newspaper ran a story of a major new indoor ski centre development in the Highlands and a similar story was mooted in California. The ski website Iglu launched a new cruise ship incorporating an indoor snow centre (truth very close to reality on that one) on April 1st a few years back too. Of course a few phoney snowdome developpers have fooled coimmunities into investing in proposals in locations around the world without anything ever being liklely to be built too.
That's not to say that we should treat a press release just in from the Manchester based indoor snow centre Chill Factore with any scepticism whatsoever.
They report says that a group of local knitters have joined forces to make the world's biggest bobble hat. Working through the night, the 40m x 30m hat has been constructed to sit atop the spectacular building.
The army of 120 knitters apparently worked for 350 hours, using 200kg of wool in the process. Chill Factore, the UK's longest real snow slope dips to temperatures as low as -2C, so naturally, the knitters of Manchester were concerned and wanted to keep the attraction snug.
"Our needles have been smoking, all the ladies have been working over time to get the bobble hat the right size. We're really proud of our effort, so to celebrate, we're going to kick back with a brew," said Irene Flynn, 68.
Chill Factore says the hat will remain on the roof until 12pm on 1st April.