Snow Report, July 30

We’re still thirsting for news of a big dump in the Southern Hemisphere. Yes, there’s been some fresh snow this week in Australia, New Zealand, and parts of Chile – but it hasn’t yet broken the generally dry pattern of the weather across all ski regions this month. This week, the heaviest falls amounted to barely 25cm in seven days. Come on guys! Welove2ski’s snow report lives for shots of deep powder, not sunshine…

The closest we got to that were the pictures taken on Friday morning in Perisher and Thredbo, south-eastern Australia. Both had around 20cm of snow on Wednesday night and Thursday last week.

Currently, in Perisher all 47 lifts are running and the cover is up to a metre deep. There’s a metre of cover at Thredbo too. Here’s today’s video snow report from Perisher.

Meanwhile, in New Zealand, there was some fresh snow yesterday and today – accompanied by high winds. It’s been very welcome. July has been mild on both North and South Islands, and the local ski fields have been heavily dependent on their snow cannons to maintain cover. The Remarkables, near Queenstown, have had 11cm so far from the storm – fingers crossed they gets plenty more before the skies clear. Currently, the average snow depth on the trails is 45cm.

In South America, most ski areas haven’t had heavy snow since the end of June. Bariloche in Chile reported a 10cm dusting on Monday: but Portillo and Valle Nevado have been dry for over a fortnight. Currently in Portillo the snow is 43-60cm deep.

The most exciting thing to look at in the sky have been the sunsets…

In Europe, the glacier ski season continues. Not surprisingly – given it’s July – it’s been warm and the snow is thinning rapidly. On July 2, the snow report from Les Deux Alpes in France recorded 205cm of cover on the pistes. Today, that’s down to 80cm.

In other words, for us snowfiends the past week has been about as exciting as a beach holiday in Benidorm. Still, we see they’ve got a snow machine at the Austria House Tirol on Tower Hill in London. Maybe we could ask them to blow some snow in our faces…

Hoping to do some summer skiing yourself? Then read our guide to the summer skiing resorts.

	France: Glacier skiing is currently on offer above Les Deux Alpes and Tignes. On the glacier at Les Deux Alpes, the cover is down to 85cm on the pistes – less than half the figure posted at the start of the month.
	Switzerland: Four pistes as well as the half-pipe and terrain park are open on the glacier above Saas-Fee’s. The cover is up to 229cm deep – a drop of 50cm on last week’s figure. On the glacier above Zermatt four pistes are open today.
	Austria: 22km of pistes are open on the Hintertux glacier today – but it’s a cloudy day and visibility is poor The snow cover is officially 155cm deep. We suspect that number will drop shortly.
	Italy: Above Val Senales two pistes are open. You can also ski on the glacier above Cervinia.
	Andorra: Andorra’s ski areas are closed.
	Western USA: All the mainstream resorts in the US are now closed for skiing. However, there is skiing (and a terrain park) on offer at Timberline Lodge on Mount Hood in Oregon.
	Western Canada: The glacier above Whistler is now closed for summer skiing.