J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by J2SkiNews

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.

A new cable car will open next year linking Cervinia to Plateau Rosa from where you can ski down on the Swiss side of the border to Zermatt.
The new Plateau Rosà cable car will, the resort days, offer better comfort and better views from the futuristic cabin design manufactured by Doppelmayr.
"The maxi windows will provide spectacular views during your ride up, the future is here from this winter on!" enthuses a statement from the resort.
Work preparing for the new lift began last summer when the first technical works were carried out to guarantee the general revision of the lift.
This Spring will see the continuation of these works and the replacement of the electronic and electromechanical parts, to be completed before the Summer ski opening on 2nd July 2011 and over the autumn break the cabins themselves will be replaced.
The new cable car is not the last being added to Europe's highest ski area, one of only two worldwide that tries to open (weather permitting) 365 a year for snowsports.
On the Zermatt side a new cable car from the top of the six man chairlift from Trockener Steg up to Furggsattel on the Italian border has been announced. The new 'Project' route is one of several that now appears on the Zermatt piste map, although a lift company spokesman told J2ski it probably won't be complete before 2014/15.
The new lift would produce a third route over the border which may prove preferable to the Klein Matterhorn cable car route – which can get very busy with long delays at peak times, or the long two-stage drag lift ride over the glacier by T Bar.
A second new cable car on the Zermatt side is also proposed from Plateau Rosa up to the Klein Matterhorn.

Cortina - Candidate

The International Ski Federation (FIS - www.fis-ski.com) has announced that three European ski resorts are bidding to host the 2017 FIS Alpine World Ski Championships.
By the May 1st 2011 deadline applications had been received from ?re in Sweden (which hosted the Championships as recently as 2007), Cortina d'Ampezzo in Italy (which has hosted the Championships three times previously, including the second ever event in 1932, but not since the last time in 1956) and St. Moritz in Switzerland which has previously hosted the Championships on four occasions in 1938, 1948, 1974 and 2003 and has been an unsuccessful bidder in several recent contests to stage the event.
"Just weeks after the successful 2011 editions, FIS is happy to witness the continuing interest in the organization of the FIS World Championships. This high number of applications by several nations and world's premium resorts underlines the events' importance in the global sports calendar," commented FIS President Gian Franco Kasper.
The FIS Council will make the final decision on the organizers of the 2016/2017 FIS World Championships during the 2012 Congress week in Gangwon Province in Korea on 31st May 2012 but the three candidates need to submit fully detailed applications by 1st September this year.
Only one application was received to host the combined 2017 FIS Freestyle and Snowboard World Championships, so it looks like they'll probably be staged by Spain's Sierra Nevada .
The last World Championships were staged earlier this year in Garmisch Partenkirchen, Germany; the next will be in 2-013 at Schladming, Austria and in 2015 the Championships will return to regular host Vail and Beaver Creek in Colorado, USA.

Alpine Meadows Earlier This Season

The record breaking snowpack has led to several resorts in California announcing they are extending their season in to May
Around Lake Tahoe Alpine Meadows says it will be open at least to next weekend, Sunday May 8th and Squaw Valley says it will open weekends at least to May 31st.
More still-open choices for California snow and sun include Boreal Resort which is open through May and Donner Ski Ranch which had the longest season in Northern California last year, opening to June 20, 2010, and is reporting it expects to be open at least until then this year.
Mammoth Mountain to the south is one of several resorts in California that says it has more snow this ski season than measured in any previous season. It expects to stay open daily at least until the US Independence Day holiday, July 4th.
Skiinfo.co.uk is currently showing Boreal as having the deepest snowpack in the world at 9.5m (nearly 32 feet) but the top five snow depths in the world at present are all in California, with each reporting 56.5m (nearly 22 feet) lying or deeper.

Community service you mean? Very noble AND saves the tax payer money. Sounds like a plan, I sentence you to a (rest of your) life of it. Enjoy.

The shame! It appears a public excecution maybe in order. Please hand yourself in at the nearest police station.

Kaprun, Home To The Kitzsteinhorn Glacier

It may not have been a legendary snowfall season in Austria, but the country doers now clearly lead Europe in terms of its Spring skiing opportunities, with eight summer ski glaciers operational either permanently, or some of the time, between May and October. That represents nearly 40% of all the summer ski opportunities in the northern hemisphere with the other 'big three' Alpine nations unable to muster more than three summer ski areas each. France won't have any outdoor skiing from mid-May to late-June. Within Austria itself, most of those glaciers, and a quarter of Europe's 20 remaining summer-ski glacier areas are in the Austrian Tyrol.
It's actually looking reasonably good on the glaciers at the moment too, Sölden, which will stage a big glacier mountain festival this Mayday weekend, has reported 12cm of fresh snowfall for the last seven days and the Stubaier Glacier had 5cm to top up its two metre deep base. Here the Rettenbach and Tiefenbach glaciers comprise one of the largest skiing areas with two glaciers connected by a 170m tunnel at a height of 3000m. Tiefenbach is good for gentle cruising and Rettenbach for more challenging skiing. Altogether there's over 37km of pistes and the centres are open until 8th May 2011 and re-open in September 2011.
A second option the Hintertuxer Glacier has a 255cm base at present. It (along with Zermatt) – is one of only two ski areas in the world that tries to open every day of the year fort snowsports. With skiing up to 3250m in the Zillertal Valley there are up to 86km of slopes.
The Stubaier Glacier close to Innsbruck has 200cm snow depth at the mountain. The Stubai is Austria's biggest glacier with 110km of slopes. Free skiing for children under 10 years and open until 22nd May 2011.
The Pitztal glacier is at the end of the highest cable car in Austria, the Pitz-Panoramabahn at 3440m. This highest glacier in Austria offers 48 km of pistes for all abilities as well as a cross country course, and terrain park. It's open one more week until 8th May 2011 it re-opens in September 2011 when along with Tignes in France it is one of the first to open fresh for winter 2011-12.
Kaunertal has 54km of downhill skiing, 50km of cross country tracks and a huge snowpark making up this glacier. Children under 10 ski free and it's a great point to go ski touring from. It's open right through until 12 June 2011 and reopens September 2011.
A lift pass called the 'White 5' ski pass enables skiers to ski at all five Tyrol glaciers on one lift pass card is available until 15 May 2011.
Other Austrian glaciers currently looking good include the Dachstein, the Kitzsteinhorn above Kaprun, and the Mölltal which has a 300cm base.
Temperatures in Austria are reported to be going down in the next days and the snowline will be at 1700m

Glenshee In Snowier Times

The Ski Club of Great Britain's annual Scottish slope tidy-up campaign which has seen skiers and boarders take to the slopes at Cairngorm and Nevis Range each Spring for the past three years is set to be expanded this June with the addition of a third area, Glenshee, to the programme. The Ski Club's Big Spring Clean will run at all three centres simultaneously on Sunday 12 June from 10am onwards.
Gloves and bags are provided and there will be tea and cakes for everyone who brings back a bag of litter, but volunteer participants are warned that if they plan to clean the top of the slopes at Nevis Range they'll need to buy lift tickets if they want to take the gondola up. At Cairngorm riding the funicular up is not an option, because the rules surrounding the operation of the unique mountain railway in the UK preclude walkers leaving the top station, so it's a case of hiking up with you increasingly heavy (assuming you find a lot of rubbish) bin bag before riding the train back down (entering the station at the top of you've walked up is allowed!).
"As part of our ongoing Respect the Mountain campaign we wanted to increase awareness of the environmental issues faced by resorts at the end of the season" explained the Ski Club's Emma Bebb. "Extending the Big Spring Clean to Glenshee is a positive step to spread that message even further and the clear up operation really does help the resorts tackle the problem of winter waste".
Last year 122 helpers collected 60 bags of rubbish between them. Finds over the past few years have included a decades old Marathon chocolate bar wrapper and a New York bus ticket.
The ski club launched their Respect the Mountain environmental campaign (www. respectthemountain.com) in 2004 with the aim of raising awareness with regards to environmental and safety issues connected to snowsports, funding environmental projects connected to snowsports and offering educational information to skiers, snowboarders and the snowsports industry. So far the Respect the Mountain campaign has donated £34,354.22 to a range of environmental projects from tree replanting to supporting environmental research.