1st July, 2014
Re-publication :- our Snow Report Summary, being the text up to "The Alps", is free to re-publish, but must be clearly credited to www.J2ski.com with text including "J2Ski Snow Report" linked to this page - thank you.
Snow Report Summary
With July one of the hottest months of the year in the Northern Hemisphere, it seems a little strange that the worldwide number of open ski areas returns to triple figures this month.
That is of course largely down to the fact that all Southern Hemisphere ski areas should be opened by the end of July, in addition to glacier ski areas in the Northern Hemisphere which briefly closed in the spring.
It's a changing picture in the Southern Hemisphere as we start July. Two to four weeks ago things looked very good in South America and New Zealand and worrying in Australia!
There's been little fresh snow in South America over the past fortnight but snow depths remain 'OK'. In New Zealand, warm weather along with no new snow has thinned bases and led to delayed openings. Australia by contrast had a big four day snow storm in the last week on June so things look good there now.
As we write this, however, New Zealand's ski areas are expecting their first major snowfall of the season as a "Polar Blast" moves in.
The Alps
Austria
Austria usually has the most areas open to ski of any country in the northern hemisphere from Spring through to Autumn, but the choices here do take a bit of a dip in July.
Hintertux is the safe bet, usually, aiming to open every day of the year it enters July with a 3m base and 18km of trails open served by 11 lifts. The Dachstein operates when conditions are good, it says and has a 2.7m base and five runs open. A third option is the Kitzsteinhorm, which re-opened last week and will be open until 20th July.
The Stubai glacier is coming to the end of its 10 month season and plans to close on July 4th for summer skiing and boarding, although you can still toboggan on the snow there through the summer. The Kaunertal, Molltal, Pitztal and Solden glaciers are all closed for snowsports.
So in summary, July starts with four Austrian glaciers open and will end with one or two still offering skiing in August.
France
July is the main summer skiing month in France, with the three regular contenders of the past few years all currently open.
Les 2 Alpes and Tignes both opened limited terrain for the penultimate weekend of June and have around 2m bases, both will expand to full summer operations on the first weekend of July.
At Les 2 Alpes the glacier from 3,200m above sea level has 90 hectares of slopes with eight runs, a beginner area and a freestyle area served by 16 lifts (a third of the winter total). Around 50 ski and snowboard instructors work on the glacier in the summer.
Val d'Isere's more limited ski area on the Pissaillas glacier, which was the first to open more than three weeks ago in early June, will be the first of the three to end its summer snowsports season, on 13th July this year. The other two are open into August.
It's less good news from Alpe d'Huez which had said it planned to open for skiing and boarding "as long as conditions allow" from 7th of July until 24th August. It seems they've decided already that conditions won't allow and that the glacier won't open.
Italy
Cervinia joined Passo Stelvio to offer summer skiing and snowboarding through July.
Both areas have around a 3m (10 foot) base and run conditions of packed powder.
At Stelvio all six runs are open. At Breuil-Cervinia, on the Italian and Swiss slopes of the Plateau Rosà Glacier, the area, at 3,480 metres above sea level, has 23km of slopes where the snow remains white has a 310cm base when last open in early May. It's open through to the end of August.
Switzerland
Year-round Zermatt has been the only place open to ski in Switzerland for a few weeks now (other than a small area at the Jungfraujoch above Grindelwald and Wengen) and will continue to be so for a few weeks yet.
But on the weekend of 19th and 20th July Saas Fee will open for its 10 month ski season, with 20km of groomed slopes to enjoy along with a full feature terrain park incorporating big air bag and chill-out lounge bar. The resort plans a big opening weekend party.
Norway
The three glacier areas of Folgefonn and Galdhoppigen and Stryn are all open and looking as good as ever. Each has one or two drag lifts and terrain park features.
North America
Canada
The Blackcomb glacier re-opened for summer skiing on the last Saturday of June and is open for skiing and boarding through to the 27th July from 12-3pm daily, weather permitting. Terrain is suited to advanced intermediates and experts only, who must be able to ride a drag lift (not so common in North America)
The glacier is divided up in to numerous private camps, but several lanes of the terrain park are reserved for public use if you're not signed up top one of the camps. Signage at the top of 7th Heaven gives public lane information.
USA
Timberline in Oregon which is open almost year round currently has a good snow base and a terrain park open. The small Red Lodge Mountain summer camp in Montana is another US option, scheduled to remain open to July 12th.
Japan
The main late-spring-skiing destination is Gassan, a small area which, rather like Riksgransen, is normally only open from April to June or July.
Southern Hemisphere
Africa
Afriski in Lesotho and Tiffindell in South Africa are both operational with 500-1000m of slopes open, thanks entirely to snowmaking having no natural snow cover.
Argentina
There was heavy snow in Argentina during the first half of June but it slowed down in the later half of the month. Las Lenas has a 30-50cm base and Catedral 25cm. The latter opened for the last weekend of June and plans to re-open on July 12th.
Australia
Australia is starting its July in better shape than it might have expected a week ago, when very little snow had fallen in June before the 23rd meaning that having officially opened on the 7th, most areas had little or no terrain open.
That all changed over the course of last week when 3-4 days of non-stop snowfall brought up to 1.4m (nearly five feet) of new snow to Aussie slopes, leaving most areas in good shape for the month ahead.
Perisher has a base of over a metre and over 40 lifts operating across the four resorts areas of Perisher, Smiggin Holes, Blue Cow and Guthega.
Within three days Hotham had over 70cm of snow and got six lifts going and are looking forward to what they say will be the best Australian school holiday skiing and riding in years.
Chile
Like Argentina, Chile had big pre-season snowfalls and several areas opened earlier than planned at the start off June. But also like Argentina there has been limited snowfall over the past few weeks and more is needed. Valle Nevado has a 30cm base and is now fully open. Portillo has had nearly 3m of snow through autumn and now has a 50-90cm base.
New Zealand
It's a big switcheroo on snow cover between Australia and New Zealand, the latter looking good in early June, the other pretty dire, now Australia has had huge natural snowfalls whilst it has been pretty dry and sometimes too warm in New Zealand for most of June. So while most New Zealand areas are open, snow cover stats are fairly limp – typically in the 20-40cm range. Hopefully that will change soon.
Whakapapa and Turoa which were due to open last weekend on June 28th have delayed opening for at least a week due to warn weather with little natural snowmaking and temperatures too hot for snowmaking.
Indoor Snow and Dry Slopes
If you need a quick snow fix closer to home there are more than 50 year-round indoor snow centres and several hundred artificial surface 'dry slopes' operating in more than 50 countries around the world.
For the UK there are six indoor snow centres from Hemel Hempstead to Glasgow and around 60 dry slopes.