Sorry I slept in, there was no point getting up early today ;P
But hmmm, I dunno. I've been out teaching in some pretty terrible days! Kids and school groups don't care, they have fun nonetheless.
Snow Report Hotham 2022 - Trip Reports, Pics & Conditions
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But hmmm, I dunno. I've been out teaching in some pretty terrible days! Kids and school groups don't care, they have fun nonetheless.
Survived village loops in pissing down. Good thing about rain, runs to yourself. Bad thing about rain, it's really wet Now back to bedHeading up on Friday for my first Aussie ski since 2014
first actual ski since 2017 and first time on Victorian slopes
And of course the weather had to turn! Hopefully the wind decides to die down..
Ms Pink Jacket and I were just discussing that by Friday afternoon we think it'll be skiable again.Heading up on Friday for my first Aussie ski since 2014 first actual ski since 2017 and first time on Victorian slopes
And of course the weather had to turn! Hopefully the wind decides to die down..
Yesterday was my first time skiing since 2017 too. The body was telling me all about it last night.Heading up on Friday for my first Aussie ski since 2014 first actual ski since 2017 and first time on Victorian slopes
And of course the weather had to turn! Hopefully the wind decides to die down..
Hopefully, weather clears Friday for some decent turns but in the meantime the fire is on and we've started drinking
Watch out for that “heavenly cornice” at the queue race, the run ain’t over till you’re on the chair
The bom weather station broke with 117kph winds after 44ml of rain within 15 hours.
The snow pile that was piling up outside that i've been having to dig so that we can still crack the window, is now down to dirt.
I've been locked inside the last 3 days with a crazy chest infection. Backcountry tour on monday probably wasn't a good idea. Yet I still crave getting out into the slush.
It's cooled a little but still quite warm (maybe 1-2 degrees, the bom station is still dead), very still, and not raining. in fact I think I saw some stars.
Less trafficked snow walking back from the bird just now was slippery turning to ice, which wont be fun if you hit that tomorrow. Off piste is certainly out.
But sugar snow that has had a lot of traffic was actually in good condition. I haven't been outside the last 3 days, this was my first outage to test the lungs in the cold. But the snow I walked on, and some overhead conversations at the bar about skiing this afternoon, sound promising. I think there is hope for reasonably good groomers tomorrow actually.
The damage is certainly done tho, huge loss to the base. We're probably back to an average season's early July snowpack, worse in some lower elevations.
Thankfully its forecast to fall to and sit there until tomorrow night, which means (imo) anything new snow tomorrow has a chance to bond to the old layers really well and create a nice start to the recovery of the snowpack.
hmm, dunno, reports are that its thinned but not thin.
its more wind exposed out there, perhaps the wind today was enough to keep it closed.
might also be sticky as hell and almost unskiable.
most likely to me is that they expected so few people out today that they didn't bother spending the effort opening gotcha and orchard chairs.
We just had a thunderstorm followed by some sort of hail microburst.
At the same time the shower started running all the leftover water out of the faucet and the toilet sucked in air. The pressure must have changed to much or something.
so, it looks like the pub to pub will now be Genny to Jack Frost
For a second, I got excited and thought you were announcing the new Higginbotham-Davenport access chair - as per the last Master Plan.
I note that there’s only just enough space for a (future) chair to join the top of Village with Mt Higgi. The RM seem to have leased every possible plot around the Southeast face of Corral without totally preventing the alignment of said lift.
But I don’t get my hopes up. The lift Would provide little real skiing and mostly aid bus-free access between Big D centre and Hotham Central/main village runs (a bloody good reason to build it when you look at the crowded buses this year!).
Dream on?
That lift would help reduce the bus load at peak times massively.For a second, I got excited and thought you were announcing the new Higginbotham-Davenport access chair - as per the last Master Plan.
I note that there’s only just enough space for a (future) chair to join the top of Village with Mt Higgi. The RM seem to have leased every possible plot around the Southeast face of Corral without totally preventing the alignment of said lift.
But I don’t get my hopes up. The lift Would provide little real skiing and mostly aid bus-free access between Big D centre and Hotham Central/main village runs (a bloody good reason to build it when you look at the crowded buses this year!).
Dream on?
Seems so many missed chances at hotham even blue ribbon to the top would have helped getting round the resort.
Has Blue Ribbon opened this season?
I wonder if the resort should move the last load station a few hundred metres up the hill.
Could an inexpensive platter lift work to the top of Higgi? Like the new one they put in at Buller to link Chamois and Standard runs. It's really slow but self loading and just has one operator at the top.
It allows a lot of the mountain's accomodation to access the lift network more easily without having to transit through the busy main centre, which may have been the main idea to create the link, in the first place.
headed out quite excited this morning. was easily 25cm at 1am, so Bill's report of 28-30cm sounded on par. but it must have warmed up, rained a tiny bit, percolated through, and crust frozen overnight. it was garbage.
aussie pow mix with sierra cement with a slight crusty layer on top.
thankfully I've had to ski that occasionally in Japan and can ski it, but its just not relaxing fun tho.
the rest of the day just got heavier and chunkier, with bouts of wet snow/rain conditions depending on where you were on the hill.
almost perfect for base building recovering from the rain tho. so there's that.
It was garbage in spots but the lower areas had a softening of the crust enabling access to the pow underneath:
Just got the heads up. Me and the lads made it onto the Hotham Insta page, taken a week ago when u could see. Amazingly u can’t see the beers in hand and more interesting we never saw the person in the bushes taking cheeky pics of us
surely there's some permission issue with commercial and advertising shots being takenJust got the heads up. Me and the lads made it onto the Hotham Insta page, taken a week ago when u could see. Amazingly u can’t see the beers in hand and more interesting we never saw the person in the bushes taking cheeky pics of us
Just got the heads up. Me and the lads made it onto the Hotham Insta page, taken a week ago when u could see. Amazingly u can’t see the beers in hand and more interesting we never saw the person in the bushes taking cheeky pics of us
The hair looks lovely with sun shining on it
I’ve got my lawyer looking into it. But seriously, who hides in the bushes taking photos of people and then leaves without saying g’day
It was a helluva spot to sink a couple of beers and watch the sun go down
Just looked at the Hotham website and it said that if we want a skidoo to take our luggage from Jack frost to our lodge we have to book 24 hours beforehand. That was never the case before. Is that now a requirement?
Also, what time does the shuttle bus start in the morning please?
Lately we see those skidoo people going back and forward all over the place non stop, they're busy af. A bit hard these days to have a bunch of spare staff to be sitting around on a skidoo for you to arrive at 2am.
Both suggest that they'd begin to require bookings.
Every year I scoff at the skidoos and the "high cost for such a small distance" .... until I'm sweating my ass off after only the first trip, with 15 more trips to go. Then suddenly then it makes sense ;P
Does your lodge not have their own sled thing?
Not 100% sure when the shuttles start. It's something like first trip up at 6:45, first trip down at 7am. But it varies greatly on conditions and how busy it is.
Hotham website says open w no chains.
Maybe there was temporary closures for some sort of accident? I hear of them closing or convoying a certain direction all the time. We've just had that Sunday rush of tired, slightly drunk, boot odor breathing weekend warriors heading down, wouldn't be surprised if there was an accident.
I had heard that they expected it to open, but was only rumors. I only saw Gotcha running today.I notice orchard, gotcha and Keogh's all still showing as closed. Have you happened to hear any updates in your travels @Any ?
Long time lurker and traveling to Hotham soon for the first time in a few years. love the updates from you and others
Orchard really suffers that thaw freeze cycle, and they did a pretty good job rehabilitating the groomed slopes for today which probably cost the grooming people a heap of time. So I guess they never got to it.
Thankfully the on piste snow today was quite nice.
With some bright blue to start the day. Becoming overcast, blue, overcast, snow, blue, overcast, spitting, blue, overcast, snow, blue, overcast conditions. I was switching gloves every 8 seconds.
Off piste was quite firm and chunky, on the verge of icy blocks. Maybe some sunbaked spots might have been nicer.
Yeah heaps of people came up for the "powder day" (https://www.ski.com.au/xf/threads/hotham-2022-trip-reports-pics-conditions.91086/post-5138229) and caused queues.
Without orchard or blue ribbon to spread them out, everyone funneled into the village and hv lifts.
I'm told that all weekends in august are usually very busy tho.
I managed to haul gear for 4 people from the road over to our lodge when we stayed at Hotham - and for the trip into the lodge I parked too far up the GAP (in front of Jack Frost, rather than the staircase near Trapdoor).
My wife was kid wrangling the small humans tho, so I'm not sure who of us had the better deal.
Look at that smile on the lad's face - looks over the moon!Got him in to lesson today
everyone say BLUEBIRD!
So I booked my lift tickets for this weekend (13-14th) on Thursday (4th)..only to discover I made an error.
So I sent a help request on the 4th to alter the booking.
Hotham lift company don't interact over the phone.
I can't cancel my existing booking online - that has to be done via a help request too.
I've pinged Hotham on social media.
Still crickets.
Interesting customer experience when you are charging premium prices.
Im going up this Friday for the week. Just hoping the Harrietville road stays open? Cant see much snow happening this week.Got him in to lesson today
everyone say BLUEBIRD!
The good lesson, or is he skiing?
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