Snow season

[Camminata]

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-n ... An7yBPxacg


Interesting but not surprising.

[Xplora]

An article looking at resorts only and how climate change is affecting them. It mentions how resorts need to focus on activities outside the ski season. Thredbo has been doing that for a long time but others have been so winter focussed, to the point that support for summer activities were actively quashed, but it is changing slowly. The bigger mountains will always do better in winter and keep snow longer. Bogong has some cover at the moment but not enough to make a trip worthwhile. Some fresh snow overnight but again not enough.

I have no interest in winter resort activities but it does contribute to the economy. If the people do not change their attitude and diversify they will go broke. Fewer winter bookings will mean higher winter prices which then equates to fewer winter bookings.

[paidal_chalne_vala]

I really enjoy XC skiing and Back country ski touring but that requires real snow cover which in Australia is becoming seemingly scarcer and more unreliable each year.

It seems I may simply save up and spend more of my ski money/time abroad .Others may come to this conclusion too. So therefore the businesses based in our sub alpine and alpine areas need to diversify their attractions.

Bushwalking is one such option.

[Moondog55]

I'm packing up my base camp gear and getting ready for the trek out to Pretty Valley. But reports so far say that the first few kilometres still have no snow, just naked bare bitumen and I'm not looking forward to the hard slog.
But if anybody is up there after the school holidays drop in and if I'm there we can share a cuppa

[stry]

When are you guesstimating to be at PV, MD ?

And where will you leave your car ?

[paidal_chalne_vala]

I XC skied over the Mt. Mckay area and down to Pretty Valley Hut on 1-7-24.
The r*** today is not helping things at all. The groomers' report for Falls Creek XC skiing is grim.
The snow cover at Pretty Valley down to the pondage is holding up and is rated as good and is being groomed .
More snow is predicted to fall
later this week and into next week . However we need a 30 cm dump to bring the ski touring season to life.
The weather boffins seem to think some proper winter weather is coming in late July and into early August.

[Moondog55]

I've got a seasons parking pass. So I'll be trying hard to leave it as close to Windy Corner as I can. And hoping to leave here [ Geelong] by the end of the week. I don't like the school holiday period up there.

[Moondog55]

I think I might need wheels on the pulks

[stry]

I've got a seasons parking pass. So I'll be trying hard to leave it as close to Windy Corner as I can. And hoping to leave here [ Geelong] by the end of the week. I don't like the school holiday period up there.

Thanks. Also not a fan of holiday periods - rather stay close to home and leave the bush for those whose timing options give them little choice.

[Camminata]

I XC skied over the Mt. Mckay area and down to Pretty Valley Hut on 1-7-24.
The r*** today is not helping things at all. The groomers' report for Falls Creek XC skiing is grim.
The snow cover at Pretty Valley down to the pondage is holding up and is rated as good and is being groomed .
More snow is predicted to fall
later this week and into next week . However we need a 30 cm dump to bring the ski touring season to life.
The weather boffins seem to think some proper winter weather is coming in late July and into early August.

Spring has sprung Winter never showed up.....yet ?⏱ , it looks depressing out there.

[crollsurf]

I'm packing up my base camp gear and getting ready for the trek out to Pretty Valley. But reports so far say that the first few kilometres still have no snow, just naked bare bitumen and I'm not looking forward to the hard slog.
But if anybody is up there after the school holidays drop in and if I'm there we can share a cuppa

Falls Creek is open. Could lifting kit and traversing across to Pretty Valley be an option?

Sent from my SM-G998B using Tapatalk

[Moondog55]

That is an option for taking some LW gear because I have a lift pass, but the big stuff will need to be hauled in still.
I've seen dud seasons before but I think climate change is here to stay and skiing will be dead inside this decade

[Biggles]

That is an option for taking some LW gear because I have a lift pass, but the big stuff will need to be hauled in still.
I've seen dud seasons before but I think climate change is here to stay and skiing will be dead inside this decade

There will be a blast of snow tomorrow afternoon and more to follow up until Monday. This is an antarctic clearance, and guaranteed to get the chill going! It will probably come with poor visibility and nasty winds.

There should be extant snow from the other side of the dam wall to Pretty Valley (which is at a higher elevation); the problem is this much warmer weather is melting the snow rapidly, not helped by days of rain (like yesterday) and way above average overnight temperatures that don't even favour snow making. I think Falls last had a snowfall on 1st July (?).

Have you pegged out a reasonably sheltered position at Pretty Valley? or a Plan B, like the hut (if it isn't locked)? It is a very, very bleak place to be when poor weather sets in.

[paidal_chalne_vala]

This looked like winter to me on July 1st 2024.

https://www.ski.com.au/xf/threads/falls ... st-5690696

We skied it as soon as the system cleared and were on the hill at Falls Creek the next day on very fresh complete snow cover.

There looks like signs that skiable snow might fall in the last part of July and into early August.
I am counting on this because I have ski trip to the KNP booked followed by a week booked
at the Bogong Rover Chalet.
If we Rover Chalet skiers XC ski over to Pretty Valley Hut then we might see Moondog ensconced in his element.
I tend to agree with MD ( from whom I have purchased skis with telemark bindings from ) that Australian resort skiing is on life support
due to Global warming and will be dead within this decade.
I have made my plans to ski abroad and to do other things in the southern winter when there is no snow. Increasingly there is less
skiable snow in Australia each year , and this is occurring more frequently each year .

Last edited by paidal_chalne_vala on Thu 11 Jul, 2024 6:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[Moondog55]

I've just had an email from a mate at Hotham that Hotham has lost most of the snow that makes skiing fun and he pulled the plug early on his weeks skiing.
Maybe we'll get some snow early next week but I'm holding back now for a few days

[Biggles]

I've just had an email from a mate at Hotham that Hotham has lost most of the snow that makes skiing fun and he pulled the plug early on his weeks skiing.
Maybe we'll get some snow early next week but I'm holding back now for a few days

Falls and Hotham are pretty much sharing the same outlook. Closer to Melbourne, nil, zero, zilch...nada. Good for bushwalking and maybe sightseeing after a dusting of snow...

But, surely the scenery up there without much snow would be just as good?
Pretty Valley is renowned for its scenic qualities — the taoist contortions of snowgums in atmospheric fog and rain, with patches of isolated snow (some snow patches were extant in shadowed depressions in January this year), look far better in a photograph (or a painting) than in a total white-washed snowy landscape. You could put skins or wheels on the sled to get to PV from Falls (?). Photographers, painters etc. were so plentiful in January that each had to take turns with their study of the gorgeous landscape, then move off for the next, and so on!

Not so much a revelation as a very rude impost on families who, for many, just want to experience snow for the first time — item by Mike Atkinson who has a very long history of skiing at Hotham. =====>https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/aussie-ski-pass-price-surge-revealed/video/b565d658055d15d05309e555cd1a0696

[Baeng72]

For me, the issue of skiing is a shame, but humans are able to reorient themselves, and get a kick out of their lives another way. Though things like irrigation and hydro are more precarious.
But for flora and fauna that evolved for regular meters deep snow, then it's a problem. Snow gums die back, life cycles break down, etc. Things can't keep migrating higher, if they were mobile, when there is no higher.

I guess I feel that way about industries and ways of living that pollute the planet and cause ecological collapse. We can retrain, do something else meaningful. Nobody needs to be a coal miner, or whatever just like they didn't need to be a whaler. But nature can't.
The system as we know it will inevitably destroy itself (continued growth on a finite planet is not possible). But no politician will ever say, hey, you know, growth is bad, we need to stop new fossil fuel extractions, native logging, damming rivers, exploiting, and all that, because it will/would hurt and they want to be popular (sortition is a better system for selecting representatives here). Anyway, I guess we'll keep barrelling along until we drop off a cliff with all this.

Excuse the rant.

[Moondog55]

Not at all, I'm a firm believer in "Steady State Economics" but I seem to be in a minority of one.
We could actually do something, it is a shame and a real dilemma that we are choosing not to do so

[Camminata]

Pic says it all, passing thru the west of Melb yesterday.

Human race choking planet Earth, what a shiit show we are.

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Last edited by Camminata on Thu 11 Jul, 2024 5:37 pm, edited 2 times in total.

[Biggles]

Goodness me, Coode Island all over again...

That calamity is an abject lesson how *not* to store hazardous chemicals!

[paidal_chalne_vala]

There is a big low dump of snow coming to Baw Baw and Lake Mtn. on July 15-17th 2024. Make of it what you will. I am going skiing !!

[Moondog55]

Looking reasonable at Falls Creek after this week-end
Heading up tomorrow early or very late tonite

[stry]

The weather here recently,and particularly today, is suggestive of steady falls at Donna, Lake Mountain, and across all the elevated country toward Matlock. Further afield I can't say.

This looks steady enough to suck the heat out the ground, and uncooled soil has a lot to do with snow not lasting.

[paidal_chalne_vala]

So much snow is falling . I love it . I am going to the KNP tomorrow to ski lifts , BC ski tour and classic XC ski at Perisher.

[Camminata]

Snow was dumping at Gwinear Flats last night and today

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[Baeng72]

Snow was dumping at Gwinear Flats last night and today

Nice one! Looks like good conditions for snow shoeing.

[Camminata]

Snow was dumping at Gwinear Flats last night and today

Nice one! Looks like good conditions for snow shoeing.

Was great this morning stomping on fluffy soft powder : )

[Baeng72]

Did you need chains to get up to St Gwinear carpark?

[Camminata]

Did you need chains to get up to St Gwinear carpark?

Illegal not to carry them to Gwinear Car .P..... fitted them on the return, snow down to 600 meters

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[paidal_chalne_vala]

So much snow.
I was out in the Kosci Nat. Park for five nights and four days of skiing.
click here for photos.
https://www.ski.com.au/xf/threads/horse ... st-5713433