Snow of the week
All the west coast Canadian resorts had fresh snow this week. Whistler/Blackcomb received a metre in four days leaving 205cm consolidated snow depth on the lower slopes, 320cm on the uppers and classic alpine skiing conditions.
Temperatures have dipped in the United States, bringing a fresh dusting of snow and good sport to Colorado and California. Aspen (110/130cm), Mammoth (245/275cm) and Heavenly (135/245cm) are all in good nick. But Jackson Hole, Wyoming, is the pick of the bunch with fresh snow at all levels, 200cm lower down and 225cms higher up.
Snow-starved Europe has struggled through the winter on a combination of pisteurs and vin chaud . Now, with snow finally deigning to visit, the temperatures have risen too. This means melted snow on the lower slopes is refreezing overnight in a fragile crystallised way which can cause problems.
The northern alps are best, Les Arcs has good sport with 75cm lower slope depth and 109 upper, as does La Plagne (50/200cm) which had a few centimetres snowfall this week.
Andorra has been the surprise package of the season with the most consistent snow cover in Europe, and with snowfall last week. All the resorts are totally operational. Soldeu has 90cm lower down and 150cm up top.
After a rotten season in which recent melt exposed rocks and grass Bulgaria has just enjoyed heavy snowfall... watch this space.
Deal of the week
Club Pavilion (0870 055 0870) offers seven nights' half-board at Club Solana at Soldeu, Andorra, for £259, based on four sharing. The price includes return flights and transfers departing from Manchester or Gatwick on 24 March.
Website of the week
The net version of one of Britain's best-selling ski magazines, www.goodskiguide.com has the same features, news and competitions as the hard copy, but without the tree loss. It produces about six issues stretching across the ski season, including a comprehensive but highly subjective resort guide that, for each destination, gives 'good points' and 'bad points' and a boredom threshhold time limit which ranges from two days (at Marble Mountain, Newfoundland) to three weeks (Davos, Switzerland).
