Still Skiing At Squaw
The number of 'still open for snow sports' ski areas in the Alps has plumetted to less than 20 in the past week with every ski centre in France now closed, but open ski areas in the western US unusually remain in double figures thanks to the big snowfalls which, to a lesser extent, are still occurring in California.
Alpine Meadows, which will finally close at the end of the ski day on Sunday, still has chairlifts scraping along the top of the snowpack, which received another inch of new snow in the past 24 hours. The base there is 231 inches (5.8 metres).
It's a similar story at Squaw Valley which is open weekends through May and recently decided to offer discounts to anyone arriving with an expired 10-11 season ticket from any other resort.
"Mother Nature has been especially kind to us this season," said Julie Maurer, the resort's Vice President of Marketing and Sales. "We have broken every season snowfall total on record, and we wanted to give other pass holders a chance to be a part of this legendary season. We still have a 155" base and we are operating several lifts including the ever popular KT-22 through May 30, conditions permitting,"
Also open in California are Boreal, Donner and Mount Rose. In Colorado Arapahoe Basin is the only area still open following Loveland's closure at the weekend but you can also ski or board at Mt Bachelor in Oregon until at least June.
The three resorts likely to stay open the longest in the US however are mammoth Mountain in California which is aiming to be open daily to July 4th for the fifth time in eight years (It's looking likely as this season has seen its greatest ever snowfall); Crystal Mountain in Washington state which is aiming for the same date but is open at weekends only, and Timberline on Mt hood in Oregon which aims to open 50 weeks of the year, just closing for a fortnight in kid-September. It's currently looking good with a 5.2m base according to skiinfo.co.uk and 18cm of new snow in the past week it's looking promising there too.