‘Another mint day’ at skifields
Snow in abundance, sunshine and light winds have provided almost perfect conditions for Canterbury skifields over the past week. Saturday and yesterday were no different.
The major skifields of the South Island, including Mt Hutt, Porters Alpine Resort and Coronet were open on Sunday reporting a range of snow bases between 40cm up to more than a metre.
Snow conditions after the dump of powder earlier in the month continued to deliver the goods for keen skiiers, Mt Hutt ski area manager James McKenzie said.
The entire mountain was open, with a 1.2m base on the trails, he said.
“It’s an absolutely spectacular day. We’re having the best day ever.”
The run of sunshine and light winds was “just fantastic for this time of year”, he said.
A lot of skiiers were only able to make it to the slopes over weekends, so it was “nice to put it on for them”.
Mt Hutt general manager James Urquhart said one of the slopes on Saturday gave him a day to remember after an “awesome week”.
“Skiing the South Face was my best day in two years regarding snow. [It] was epic.”
Porters Alpine Resort reported “another mint day” yesterday, saying the mountain was “looking the best it has all winter”.
Coronet Peak area manager Nigel Kerr said the conditions and snow had been “consistently improving for the last two weeks”.
The field had closed one day since the start of the season, which was “pretty normal”, he said. “The groomers are getting more snow to work with, all our runs and a few extras are open. The crowds have been above expectation.”
However, Metservice meteorologist Alwyn Bakker said this week’s weather wasn’t looking good for bringing more snow to the fields.
“But what’s there is going to stay there,” he said.
McKenzie said at Mt Hutt he just took “every day as it comes”. “It started out pretty rough this season. It’s definitely stepped up a level here. The weather has the final say in how things pan out.”