There’s a pretty positive vibe swimming around the Oz resorts at the moment.
After a great June (except for Buller), July was a bit of a letdown but August has really delivered. Regular snowfalls, very little rain and snow depths rivalling the most recent great season in 2004.
Weather patterns can often set in on a weekly basis, I remember 2008 which is probably the most recent season ‘of note’ and during late July/early Aug the storms often delivered on Thu/Fri leaving great powder for the weekend warriors.
This last few weeks it has been a day earlier, with Friday seemingly the day of the week, it certainly was at Hotham last weekend, and I was definitely reminded this was the case the week prior when I missed the Friday at Buller. But I got to ski the Friday before that which was nice.
So with all this in mind, it’s been an ‘Awesome August’ with a pattern of ‘Fabulous Fridays’, and I think tomorrow will be no different. To add in another omen, the ‘Olympic Year’ rule is working well, the last Olympic year with crap snow was 1988.
If there was ever a day to Chuck a Snowie, tomorrow is it.
Reports are coming in via SMS of 20-odd cm of fresh at Buller & fabulous skiing. Interschools finishes tomorrow but that’s never an issue when the mountain is open because it concentrates the hordes around the race courses. The radar looks dead sexy with snowfalls set to continue tomorrow and then clear for the weekend.
Here’s some random Instagrams I’ve found around the net from today:
But you know what makes me most excited about all this?
Spring.
Yep, Spring.
Winter skiing in Australia is fun, but it can be fickle and if you’re a day early or late the conditions can be totally different, so while I try to pick the eyes out of the available conditions and ski as much as I can, the thing that excites me most about the ever growing snowfall totals is the prospect of a long Spring. Tomorrow marks the last day of Winter and Saturday is the 1st of September, signalling the start of my favourite season.
From a commercial point of view the season pretty much finishes this weekend. Once the Interschools is done at Buller the crowds die down & September is ‘wind-down’ period, but for me it’s when things are ramping up. By this stage I’m generally ski-fit and ready to go hard.
Corn snow, slush bumps, blue skies, Buller chutes, no lift lines, ski touring – everything is possible and quite reliable in a good spring. And after the amount of snow I saw on the ground at Hotham last week, this is set to be a long one. I can see a good few sessions of ski touring in October when the lifts are closed. There’s even enough snow to cope with a catastrophic rain event.
So with all this in mind I sit here typing this in a zen-like state of contentment. There’s almost two months of quality skiing ahead and I intend to make the most of it.
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