Zermatt and Cervinia's Plateau Rosa (Switzerland and Italy) earlier today...
Ski season about to start in Australia, with snow in the forecast. A handful of summer options in the Alps, and a few in America.
The Snow Headlines - June 5th
- Australia's 2025 ski season starts this weekend.
- Val d'Isere is opening for summer ski season, joining Les 2 Alpes.
- Japan's Gassan Glacier only ski area still open there, base thawed to 3.3m (11 feet).
- Colorado's A basin adds another weekend but says it will be the last of the season.
- Molltal Glacier ends long 24-25 season, only Hintertux still open in Austria next week.
There is snow forecast for Australia.
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World Overview
If we measure the seasons on the meteorological scale, winter arrived on Sunday in the southern hemisphere and summer in the northern. By astronomical measures, though, it's still autumn/spring for another fortnight or so.
Whichever you prefer, we can all agree it hasn't been a very snowy week anywhere... but there is snow forecast for Australia this weekend.
It has been close to freezing, or below, overnight at the southern hemisphere centres that aim to open for their 2025 seasons imminently, and up high on European glaciers and selected Japanese and US centres that are among the dozen or so where we're still skiing in the northern hemisphere. That's been cold enough for snow-making in the southern hemisphere and for freeze-thaw summer ski conditions in the northern.
The main action this coming week is the official start of Australia's ski season with possible areas opening in Chile and Lesotho too. In the northern, more summer ski glacier areas have been opening for their 2025 seasons in the Alps.
Southern Hemisphere
Australia
Australia's ski season begins this weekend, the first of the main four southern hemisphere ski nations to see most of its resorts open, although it seems not all will have ski runs available initially.
This weekend is a long one in Australia, with the King's Birthday public holiday on Monday the 9th in most Aussie states, including the two main ski states of New South Wales and Victoria.
It's not yet clear quite how much terrain will open from Saturday, although there is a useful amount of snowfall now in the forecast for the weekend and into next week.
Mount Buller has been making much of its five Snow-factory TechnoAlpin all-weather snowmakers having produced a big pile of snow to spread out on their main run.
Thredbo has also confirmed they'll have at least on run open on Saturday. However, Falls Creek, Mount Hotham and perisher all say it's a close call, with the chance of some terrain opening but with 48 hours to go, unsure if they definitely will have.
The only major areas not opening this weekend are at Charlotte Pass and Selwyn Resort.
Perisher reported a beautiful sunrise on Thursday with their teams preparing the finishing touches to the resort before opening day this Saturday. Temperatures dipped to -6C overnight with 103 snow guns firing up, as well.
Conditions are set to turn much more wintery from Saturday with colder temperatures and significant snowfall expected at the weekend continuing into next week, so it could be a snowy season start.
New Zealand
New Zealand's season proper was always scheduled to start the weekend after next, and Mount Hutt's tentative early-opening plan has now rolled back to the weekend of the 14th, when several other areas also plan to open.
It's actually looking like this will be a wintery weekend with some decent snowfalls but temperatures are set to warm again next week with tropical airflows coming down from the north.
Argentina
Argentina's ski season is not expected to start for another week or so, with the continent's largest area, Catedral, likely to be amongst the first to open in the middle of the month.
Much of the past week has been dry and sunny, but many mountainous regions benefitted from a front moving through on Tuesday-Wednesday which brought 20-40cm snowfall accumulations, further improving bases ahead of the season start, which for most areas will be around the 21st of the month.
We're back to sunshine for most areas this weekend but temperatures remain low and more snowfall is forecast next week.
Chile
It's been a largely sunny week in Chile, with temperatures cold enough for snowmaking overnight (-5/-6C), but getting up to +7 or +8 in the daytime, so not ideal for base building.
Several centres including La Parva, Corralco and El Colorado often do open at the start of June so there's a chance one will this weekend, but none have announced an intention to do so as yet.
There's currently little change in the forecast with sunny skies and similar temperatures continuing into next week.
Lesotho
Lesotho's season is officially underway but there's been no confirmation as yet that any ski slopes have opened. Webcams are currently offline (blamed on a power surge) and the resort has stopped publishing snow conditions itself on its site, so it's a case of waiting for social media evidence that people are skiing again, of which there has been little sign.
Northern Hemisphere
The Alps
We're briefly up to six ski areas open in the Alps this weekend with Val d'Isere opening for the start of its brief 2025 summer ski season (through to the start of July) whilst Austria's Molltal glacier completes its seven-month run from last October, closing the few hundred metres of slope it still has open this Sunday.
That leaves just the Hintertux glacier still open in Austria whilst the French count is back up to two with Les 2 Alpes still operating its glacier ski area.
Italy's Passo Stelvio opened for its 2025 season in glorious sunshine last weekend, reporting the snow lying six feet (1.8m) deep up top.
You can also take ski lifts up from Cervinia still to ski the Matterhorn Glacier Paradise area shared with Switzerland's Zermatt, the only centre currently open there and still posting 35km of slopes open across the border, probably the most in the world at present, certainly in Europe.
The weather has continued to be a mix of prolonged sunny periods and occasional showers. The freezing point has been up to 3,000m, sometimes 3,500m, meaning it's been rain to ever higher altitudes although most glaciers have also reported light to moderate snowfalls, typically 10-15cm, mostly in the late afternoons and/or overnight.
Scandinavia
Two Norwegian glacier areas, Stryn and Galdhopiggen, are currently open. Both have been reporting overnight lows down at freezing and some snow showers. Daytime highs have been around +5C at Galdhopiggen, but warmer at lower-lying Stryn. The new operators of the country's third summer glacier area Fonna have confirmed their drag lift won't operate this year, but they are offering catskiing sessions later this month.
USA
After half a dozen US ski areas closed last week we can now count the number of still open areas on one hand.
Arapahoe Basin in Colorado has, as usual, been open the longest, its season is now more than seven months old. It has announced it will open this weekend and next, but that it will end its season on the 15th. Its snow depth is down to about a metre on the upper mountain.
It's probably a similar story at California's Mammoth Mountain, with Oregon's Timberline normally the longest to stay open and currently posting the continent's deepest snowpack at just under 3 metres.
Besides these three that have been open since 2024, Wyoming's Beartooth Basin summer ski area opened last week for its first operation in two years and there's also a hike-to terrain park open at weekends at Copper Mountain in Colorado.
Most of these are open daily but A-Basin has now dropped to Friday-Sunday opening and that's when Copper's terrain park is open to the public too (it is for private use by attendees of its summer snow camps during the week).
The past week has been mostly sunny across these five areas, with temperatures on the highest slopes close to freezing at night but afternoons seeing highs of +15 to +20C, so plenty of thawing and as A-Basin put it; "slushy snow". That's pretty much the forecast for the week ahead too.