J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by J2SkiNews

The most optimistic of skiers and boarders can be forgiven for getting excited about the season ahead with the news that a 20cm (8 inch) snowfall was reported in the last 24 hours on Norway's Fonna glacier summer ski area up in Scandinavia.

Skiers and boarders visiting Fonna yesterday and today were greeted by fresh August powder on the slopes where the snow is lying 3m/10 feet deep – the second deepest reported snow base in the world - northern and southern hemispheres. The other still-open Norwegian summer ski area, Galdhoppigen, claims the deepest at 5 metres on its upper slopes.

Besides these two Norwegian centres about 10 more centres are currently open for summer skiing in the Northern Hemisphere, most in the Alps – including Les 2 Alpes, Cervinia, Hintertux (pictured above last month), Tignes, Saas Fee and Zermatt; whilst across the Atlantic Timberline on Mt Hood in Oregon is also open.

In the southern hemisphere it's mid-winter and most resorts are now in good shape after mixed fortunes in June and July. Southern African ski areas – where there's two weeks of the season left – are reporting their best conditions for 20 years, which is as long ort longer than Tiffindell in South Africa and Afriski in Lesotho have actually been around.

Vail Resorts have announced they are buying the 2010 Winter Olympics venue and North America's largest ski area, Whistler Blackcomb.

It's the latest and arguably most audacious purchased yet by Vail which will now operate a dozen ski areas in three countries, including the two largest in North America, having created the latest 'biggest in the US' last season by merging two formerly separate areas at Park City in Utah.

Vail also own Perisher, Australia's largest resort and other famous centres such as Breckenridge and Heavenly.

"Whistler Blackcomb is one of the most iconic mountain resorts in the world with an incredible history, passionate employees and a strong community. With our combined experience and expertise, together we will build upon the guest experience at Whistler Blackcomb while preserving the unique brand and character of the resort as an iconic Canadian destination for guests around the world. We are delighted to add such a renowned resort to Vail Resorts and look forward to expanding our relationships in the Sea-to-Sky community, British Columbia and Canada," said Rob Katz, chairman and CEO of Vail Resorts.

Whistler Blackcomb was brought to prominence by the Intrawest Group, originally based out of the region, which found huge success by building modern resort bases at ski areas that didn't have them, or dramatically improved what was there. The business model was more property than lift-ticket sales based which meant rapid growth in the boom years of the property market and less seasonal impact from weather conditions. At its peak the company set up Arc 1950 in Les Arcs and a development at Flaine as well as operating an indoor snow centre in Madrid. Whistler was sold shortly before the global property crash and Intrawest has been contracting for much of the past decade, moving their head quarters to Colorado.

"Combining Whistler Blackcomb with Vail Resorts' portfolio of outstanding resorts provides Whistler Blackcomb with increased financial strength, marketing exposure, guest relationships and broadens the geographic diversity of our company with resorts across the United States, as well as in Australia and Canada. This relationship will bring greater resources to support our current operations and our ambitious growth plans, including the Renaissance project, the most exciting and transformative investment in Whistler Blackcomb's history," said Dave Brownlie, Whistler Blackcomb's current chief executive officer.

This year's London Ski and snowboard Show looks set to be the only major show in the UK this Autumn after organisers Telegraph Events confirmed they were dropping their 'North' show in Manchester.

In an email response to an enquiry from J2Ski a spokesperson for Telegraph Events said that previous online ticket buyers for the Manchester show had received an email discount for the London show in October this autumn.

The Manchester show is the last of the big regional shows to cease operating following shows in Birmingham and Glasgow which have closed over the past five years.

The London show moved from its long time venue at Olympia or Earls Court for the past four decades to a smaller complex in Battersea Park last autumn. Attendance in 2015 was down by about a third to 25,587 compared to 35,269 who attended the show in 2014.

In it's heyday in the 1980s the show was staged over 10 days and attracted hundreds of thousands of visitors.

The Manchester Show's website currently remains live but showimng previews for the last show in autumn 2015: http://north.skiandsnowboard.co.uk/

The spectacular views of the Alps enjoyed by skiers and boarders descending on the year-round snow slopes of The Snow Centre north of London have turned from the Austrian Tirol to the Swiss Valais region.

Switzerland tourism has signed a major deal with The Snow Centre that has seen as massive mountain montage from Switzerland covering its walls to provider spectacular mountain scenery indoors.

But the deal goes much further than that, with other parts of the facility also carrying Swiss branding and a partnership agreement that will also see Switzerland tourism sending marketing material to Snow centre customers and the centre organising five ski holidays a year to the Valais region – location of some of the world's most famous ski areas, with trips led by instructors from The Snow Centre.



"In order to be front of mind of new skiers, Switzerland wants to be present at their first attempts on the slopes. This was the reason for Switzerland Tourism together with the Valais entering a three-year partnership with the Snow Centre in Hemel Hempstead," a spokesperson for Switzerland tourism commented, "This is a great way to position Switzerland as early as possible as the ideal ski destination for this new audience."

Besides the branding of the indoor slope, the joint marketing and the trips there will be Swiss specialties available in the restaurant and a check-in area representing Swiss International Air Lines.

The Snow Centre's slopes originally had a large mural from the Austrian Tirol resort of Solden on its walls since opening, but that deal is believed to have expired some years ago. The new agreement lasts for three years.

From 7-9 October, a public launch event will mark the official start of the partnership.

Two of the world's existing largest ski lift pass systems have merged for the 2016-17 ski season, but they say the 2,750km served by more than 900 lifts now available on one lift pss, valid for one day or more, s only the planet's second biggest. We're not sure what's bigger.

The new version of the Kitzbüheler Alpen All Star Card encompasses the lifts at 25 of Austria's ski regions, including two of the three largest next season – the Saalbach – Fieberbrunn combined pass and the SkiWelt. It's expansion comes thanks to the inclusion of the former competitor, the Salzburg Super Ski Card.

But the people behind the expanded area want you to think about more than just size, they say they offer top quality too,

"All the ski regions are equipped with the most up-to-date facilities. 2,100 km of the slopes are equipped with artificial snowmaking so that they're ready for winter from the very start of the season", emphasises Hansjörg Kogler, spokesman for the Kitzbüheler Alpen All Star Card and also managing director of the Bergbahnen Westendorf in the SkiWelt Wilder Kaiser – Brixental.

"Every year we've been investing millions in the qualitative improvement of our resorts – which is also the case with our colleagues at Salzburg Super Ski Card. We're all leading international ski resorts – together we're able to offer visitors slopes and lift quality which are second to none in the world. We're very pleased about the new collaboration – what goes together, grows together."

The Kitzbüheler Alpen All Star Card already encompasses 6 ski regions and 10 skiing regions in Tyrol, Salzburg and Bavaria. And now the ski resorts are being joined by ski regions in Salzburg and the neighbouring states of Upper Austria, Styria und Carinthia covered by the Salzburg Super Ski Card.

Besides its huge geographic coverage, the season pass version of the ticket (Advanced adult purchase price €680) has a long time validity of 199 skiing days, thanks in part to the fact it includes two early autumn/late May glacier ski areas. It's valid from 15th October to 1st May.

The expanded pass becomes available as a new largest-linked ski area in Austria debuts this winter with the Lech and St Anton sides of the Arlberg ski region physically linked by ski lifts and runs for the first time after more than a century of operation as neighbours.

www.allstarcard.at

A new cable car is under construction on to the Zugspitze, Germany's glaciated highest peak and highest ski area.

The lift will be built by Doppelmayr on behalf of the Bayerische Zugspitzbahn Bergbahn lift company over the next two summers and is scheduled to open in December 2017, replacing the previous lift which opened 54 years earlier in 1963. The overall project, including new terminal buildings, has a €50m budget.

The new Zugspitze cable car will be of the same standard cable car type as its predecessor and the base and upper stations will be in the same locations but, as well as having a greater uplift capacity with 120 people per cabin, and a faster speed, there are several big changes in the new lift's design which will set three world record.

Firstly, the lift will incorporate the world's highest mountain cable car support tower at 127 metres; second the greatest lift will have the greatest altitude difference yet at 1,945 metres over one section and third the lift will cross the world's longest free span between towers, a distance of 3,213 metres or about two miles.

Work on the new lift has already seen the installation of Germany's highest construction crane at 2,950 metres above sea level and the installation of a special cableway for transporting building materials to the top terminal. By the end of this year, rock removal, anchoring and concrete work at the summit station will have been completed. The old cable car will continue to run until next spring, then in summer and autumn next year guests can still use the funicular railway to access the peak until the new lift begins operations.

The 2017 construction schedule includes dismantling the existing entrance building, completion of the mountain terminal, construction of the cable car support tower as well as demolishing the old support towers and old valley terminal. Highlights of this construction phase also include the transport and installation of four cables, each weighing around 145 tons, as well as putting this state of the art ropeway technology into operation.

The new base terminal will be fully accessible and disabled friendly with cable car access and exit on one single level. A sliding platform (adjustable central platform) will facilitate a more comfortable and efficient entry and exit of the base terminal.

The new mountain terminal will still have three visitor levels, offering access to the glacier cable car but will also be accessible in future from the Münchner Haus and Tiroler Zugspitzbahn. There will also be fully glazed platforms offering spectacular panoramic views whilst getting in and out of the cable car. zugspitze.de

Ski resorts in Australia, South America, New Zealand and even Southern Africa have all been reporting significant snowfall over the past 48 hours giving a clean sweep across the hemisphere's three skiing continents for fresh powder.

Australia has been having a largely consistently good winter since mid-June anyway but the snow has keep falling and based depths are now around the metre mark (Good for Australia) at most of the country's resorts.

Perisher, the Vail-owned largest centre has had 75cm of snow in the latest storms, 30cm (a foot) today alone - pictured above, video below.



New Zealand has had a more lacklustre winter after a promising start in early June with record warm weather all year, but things have turned snowier again in the last few days, albeit with some extreme weather including 100mph winds thrown in.

In the Andes there have been more big snowfalls, with Portillo and Valle Nevado now both reporting bases over the 2m mark, the deepest in the southern hemisphere at present. Portillo has had a foot of fresh snow in the last 36 hours.

It's also unusually snowy across southern Africa with snow falling in some of South Africa's cities causing road chaos. But I's ski joy up at the area's resorts with a foot (30cm) each at Tiffindell in South Africa and at Afriski in Lesosho (pictured below yesterday).

Crans Montana Ski & Golf in Switzerland has said it opened for glacier skiing on one weekend only earlier this month and published the pic above as proof, commenting, "Thanks to good snow conditions on the glacier at an altitude of 3,000 metres, the Crans-Montana ski lift company (CMA) enabled skiers to enjoy fantastic downhill fun under bright summer sun. It was possible to ski, play golf and enjoy the beach and the lake in the same day."

Although Crans Montana is no longer open for snowsports, Saas Fee has since re-opened, last weekend, for its nine month ski season, one of the world's longest, through to Spring 2017.

It joins Zermatt as the two Swiss glacier ski areas currently open, with Zermatt one of two areas worldwide(along with Austria's Hintertux) that tries to open every day of the year, weather permitting.

Both open Swiss areas report over a 2m base on their glacier slopes having had significant fresh July snowfalls in the past few weeks.