I need to stop going away for the week, some one forgot to lock the back door at end of play at CG and an unscrupulous person nipped in and stole a lot of the snow. I think it may have been those dodgy weeges that frequent Glencoe they have way too much

We are entering my favourite time of year for Scottish skiing. The nights are longer, the snow is good and the weather is much more settled with the sun tan beginning to build.

Even with the snow loss the main runs are still in great shape, the exception being the M2, day lodge and the very bottom last few meters of the car park. The only real casualty are the links to the off piste coires have gone

The top bowls,lady and cas are good but the ciste gully and in particular the West Wall are excellent. The snow is turning into granular spring snow, very forgiving to turn in and surprisingly fast.

And as has become the trend at this time of year... no one is about... the place is deserted, even yesterday, a Sunday mid season, there were empty bars going round the lifts.

Graeme

Ignore the brown patches, between the fences have good amounts of snow. The gun barrel is still wide.


The Fiacaill run is very good. It has been pisted down to the car park and there are many different ways down to choose from.


Not the most snow I have seen in the gully but more than last year. A very pleasant ski down but the lower traverse is only two ski widths at one point but in general wide and easy.


If you ever wanted to ski the west wall but thought it was a bit daunting for your ability, now is the time to try it. Very forgiving, wide and easy to control your speed. Choose the shoulder to build your confidence then try down the face.


The access to the Aonach bowl is via Ryvoan as the m2 is broken. A nice ski but not as good as the west wall. We did it once but then retuned to the gully and WW.






Edited 1 times. Last edit at 18.06hrs Mon 21 Mar 16 by WindyMiller.

Attachments: Fiacaill.JPG (211kB)   gun barrel.JPG (275kB)   Ciste Gully.JPG (221kB)   West Wall Sholder.JPG (278kB)   Aonach.JPG (237kB)  

Please keep the West Wall going until I get back, if I ever get back.

A warm sunny morning with soft snow from the off but then the cloud level slowly crept down the hillside turning from mid up into pea soup. The snow is much softer now on many of the runs, even the bottom of the White Lady, which is an excellent ski, is getting heavy. By 15:00 most of the runs were turning heavy, a bit tiring on the legs. The exception was the west wall, this remained very nice indeed.

There are a few bare patches appearing by the end of the day, notably the M1 load area is decidedly rocky. It will be easily patched tonight but it would be nice to see some fresh snow hopefully by the end of the week if the forecast is correct.

There is still great skiing to be had.

Graeme

Start of the day, hat and gloves off. The ridge poma


Cas providing very nice skiing in the morning but getting close to porridge at the end of the day


Some nice shapes in the park but the snow is a bit soft in the afternoon


The west wall is in a leauge of its own at the moment, nice to lap


End of the day, taken from the semi completed half pipe above the ptarmigan




Edited 2 times. Last edit at 19.12hrs Tue 22 Mar 16 by WindyMiller.

Attachments: Start of Day.JPG (265kB)   cas.JPG (274kB)   Park.JPG (199kB)   West Wall.JPG (221kB)   End of Day.JPG (161kB)  

Well the weather followed the forecast to the letter. This morning first thing was a blue bird hat off day but the wind built through the morning to a full scale hoolie by the end of the day with heavy clouds blowing in. The good news is we had a great days skiing before it turned not so good.

Where was everyone? It is Good Friday and it looks like no one wants to go skiing.

The runs started off hard but by lunch time they had softened up nicely to a fast granular texture. If you looked really hard you could find a hard patch or two around the ciste bowl area.

The ciste gully and west wall opened after lunch and were fantastic but you have to use the high travers from the gully back to the poma. This was quite good as it gave you the opportunity to ski the bottom half of the WW.

Saw a perfect nomination for the Darwin Awards. A group of snow ploughers had made their way down the gully, past the ropes, through the gate and multiple warning signs and on to the west wall its self. Good on them, well done, may be next time you can try driving you Robyn Reliant on to a formula One Race Track. (I apologise to respectable Robyn Reliant drivers).

Best run of the day, a toss up between the White Lady and the Ciste Gully. Both brought smiles to my face. A close second was skiers left of the cas though the shred and rollers. With very few people, about did this at speed,fun This old guy can still move

Putting some pictures on Face Book later

[www.facebook.com]

Graeme

The runs are still wide and complete even if the mountain looks bare from the distance. Looking over to the zigzags


Good cover on the entrance to the White Lady, use this or the other side of the restaurant.


Top bowls are wide and well pisted


Massive queues on all lifts, not! Can you blame the operator thinking about closing while there is still snow? It is amazing that on a bank holiday so few people want to go skiing. Makes me think the marketing department are needing to try a different tack. Central belt radio adverts?


Still very good skiing on the Fiacaill traverse and down the ridge to the car park. Last few meters at the car park tow are a bit muddy ie no snow.






Edited 1 times. Last edit at 18.01hrs Fri 25 Mar 16 by WindyMiller.

Attachments: Fiacaill.JPG (278kB)   ciste load.JPG (289kB)   top bowls.JPG (253kB)   WL entrance.JPG (255kB)   zigzags.JPG (309kB)  

There were around 1000 people out enjoying the snowsports according to the operator. By that measure, they wouldn't be thinking about pulling the plug...would they?

Kind Regards

Olderalan

As usual there are many rumours flying around at this time of year and 1000 people on a bank holiday with excellent snow cover is not good at all and during the week the numbers are small. They need to inform and persuade some of these people that swarm up here in Feb mid term, complaining loudly about over crowding, that Easter is a much better time to go skiing. Better weather, better conditions and less people.

The Fiacaill ridge poma is being turned off late morning once we have accessed the mountain due to lack of people using it. There is discussions whither other lifts will be turned off too due to lack of people using them and concentrating on the train with mid station stops for up lift. Not good for people like me that likes to travel the mountain but you can not blame them for considering these options.

Graeme

The Numpties who try to run the place only have themselves to blame !!

Blind and Short-sighted......the main solutions are staring them in the face every time they drive up from Avie-moron Land !

Marketing ? It was suggested to Tania Adams......remember her ?......many years ago, about broader targeting ! !

But what do I know ? I am only one of many "Armchair Ski Area Managers"

Well those photos of 25th by Windy dont convince me 1000 folk were enjoying the snowsports on Good Friday? Are NR up to there old tricks again?
One of the reasons that put me off going to Cairngorm was the lack of accuracy in their reports, always painting a great picture to tempt folk up.
It would be a shame if they closed early. Also not great if they shut uplift to reduce costs, Im defo not interested in going there if thats there attitude. Its there own fault theres a lack of folk using the resort, they spoiled it, abused they system to there financial gain, did'nt listen to folk and now I think they are feeling it.

Having 1000 people out enjoying the snowsports at EASTER weekend is a good number. Like you, I've skied up there at Easter on countless occasions...it is never mobbed. The recent Spring weather will also have turned folks attention to Biking, golfing, gardening, sailing etc....not so much can be done about that. The poor numbers during the week will perhaps also be reflective of the fact that people remember the full prices for limited lifts and pistes earlier in the season and are now heading to Glencoe where there are more lifts open and their mid week price is lower than CairnGorm Mountain Limiteds reactive decision to offer 20% off during the mid week period....making it £28 vs £25 at Glencoe.
The snow on the pistes may be good but there is no M2, M1, DLP, and no low level pistes. The operator knows full well what happens to demand when you cannot ski to the Daylodge via the carpark run options. It would therefore be in their best interests to fully utilise the snow cannons that they have...whenever they can....not something that has been done this season or last.
The drift away from Cairn Gorm is well documented and while there will be variability from season to season depending on snowcover at each area......the graph will continue on a downward track. Nothing has been done to halt that decline.

Kind regards

Olderalan

I can't see what snow cannons could have done with the wind + frequent thaws earlier this winter.

If you look at what they have to do in Europe to maintain lower pistes, they hammer the cannons early in the season and produce huge amounts to create a fake base. That's impossible to do unless you get a period of sustained cold and the wind isn't blowing all the snow elsewhere. I'd imagine all Scottish resorts, not just Cairngorm would invest a lot in snow making if it were more feasible.

Friday was a really good day on the hill. No queues, got a seat in the cafe (twice!) and weather was better than I expected it to be.
Snow was good, hard at first but softened really nicely as the day went on. Never became too mushy! I'd agree with Windy - Ciste gully and white lady also my favourites. Just a shame you have to traverse out of the Ciste so high. Could have risked life and limb on a dodgy boardwalk but thought better of it haha.
We got there early expecting it to be busy but were surprised how quiet it was and it stayed that way all day.
Maybe it's just when people look at webcams and don't see a perfectly white mountain they think it's rubbish when it's actually really good and that's the reason for the low numbers. Who knows!

Why would winter sports participants head to a resort that treats them as second class customers?

They go to resorts where they are the number one customers.

No surprise that the ski areas who are a ski resort first, cakehunter safari second are gaining in skier days instead of cakehunters first, snowsports second.

Not a good business model. Sacrifice customers who will be repeat customers to appease tourists who appear once.

It's often been said that it is too windy/mild/wet/high humidity for snowmaking to make a substantial difference in Scotland. There was an 8 day period from 21 February 2016 when snow could have been made continuously as temperatures were low enough and the winds were mostly light. That would have been more than enough to have ensured a piste to the Daylodge on Cairn Gorm through until today and beyond. The fact remains that the opportunity to utilise the 5 Techno Alpin snow cannons that are there was not taken.... although the period of sustained cold that you mention did in fact occur.

Kind regards

Olderalan

Its not just me then who isn't prepared to pay money to ski their "great ski" conditions

after years of mismanagement it appears others are now voting with their feet. Used to go to CG regularly 5+ times a season, about 3-4 years ago was the final straw for me. Got there early, bought ticket and was on first train, not an issue. First hour was okay, got some good runs in, but then it started getting busy, only the train and the cas were running due to the wind, and the train was doing midstation stops. I was waiting over an hour for each run. When I got home their facebook page stated something like "2000 people out enjoying the hill today" think the uplift they had on tht day had a capacity of 1500 people per hour or something like that, cant remember the exact figures.

I know weather changes from forecast and the wind was due to drop and didnt, but at some point they should have stopped letting people on the hill, £30+ for 2 lifts was an absolute joke, it was the last time I went to cairngorm, now I visiet GC and Nevis instead.