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Posted on Friday September 25th at 9:15 a.m.
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Off piste can get variable at this time of year... or not.
But wait!!
What's that!! A cold front after six weeks of record high temps!! Unbelievable.
Just when you thought that it was over and that only die-hards would venture to the slopes the forecast is for more snow, lots of snow. Well, the most since May anyway.
An El Niño event looks to be developing across the Pacific: the latest outputs from computer models indicate it will reach peak intensity late in the year. This means most of the prevailing weather will be coming in from the west with wet conditions in the west and dryer conditions in the east.
This is great for TC ( check out their snow graph!! ) which is close to the divide but not so good for Lyford which is on the inland Kaikoura's and already closed for the season.
I love this time of year but you have to pick your day. Last year we travelled from the South Island to spend time at Ruapehu for a ten day trip and every single day turned out to be a blizzard. We didn't even venture up the mountain road it was so bad.
When you get a good one it is REALLY good. At this time of year the snow can be dry winter snow, spring corn or elephant snot depending on the weather, aspect of the slope and where you are geographically. Don't write off elephant snot either just get, or rent yourself a snowboard or some fats and have a blast. I learned to snowboard over two spring's in the early '90's in the deepest elephant snot on record at Whakapapa.
In a recent trip up to Porters I skied light dry powder on the shady slopes and spring corn on the sunny in consecutive runs.
The snow is reserved for the piste only, no chains required.
You can pick the base area, right at the edge of the snow.
Still great on piste at Porters this spring.
...and Bluff Face out of the direct sun still going strong.
Contemplating T3.
Porters good to go until the end of the school holidays.
A good strategy for this time of year is;
- watch the forecast, plan only one or two days ahead (because spring is changable an even the forecasters struggle to get it right more than a few days out),
- take your time - there's no rush, there are few people and the melt freeze doesn't soften until mid-morning,
- Layer up (the clothes), that way you can wear the amount appropriate to the temps as they change.
- Sunny's sunny's sunny's
- WEAR SUNSCREEN (see below... no really see below)
I attended the NZSIA ISIA refresher course at Mt Hutt this week. A big thank you to Stephanie for her succinct instruction and David for his "perfect man" demos. The day started out at 8 degrees and ended prematurely at 2pm on -2 when the southerly front came through. Just to stress how fast conditions can change at this time of year we stood at the bottom of Broadway and watched the cloud approach and then by the time we had skied to the lift and reached the first tower we could not see the chair in front of us. The snow at Hutt is great on piste with more expected in the short term. On-piste riding at Hutt is looking sweet for the school holidays and following week.
Wide open slopes with no people at Mt Hutt.
David showing how it should be done.
Again the carpark is the end of the snow.
Plenty on-piste though.
Class in session.
Can't get enough of this terrain.
Stylie conditions and nobody home.
Mt Hutt from Bob's Knob.
Plenty of snow left for the next three weeks.
Here comes the southerly...
...rolling on in.
The little know Wherethefukawe trib of Mid-Canterbury.
2009 Closing Dates
Whakapapa October 26th
Turoa October 26th
Rainbow September 27th
Lyford CLOSED FOR THE SEASON
Porters October 11th
Mt Hutt October 18th
Round Hill September 27th
Dobson October 4th
Ohau October 4th
Treble Cone October 4th
Cardrona October 4th
Snowpark October 3rd
Coronet Peak October 4th
The Remarkables October 11th
Thanks to Mt Hutt for providing a media pass for my recent visit.