Alps Weather And Skiing Conditions

[J10]

During the course of the Skiing season, I will be doing regular blogs forecasting the weather for the Alpine Resorts over the course of the season.

If you would like a particular resort featured please let me know as I will be doing regular resort updates during the course of the season. This season there will be a slight range to the blog, in order to tie in better with most skiing holidays being Saturday - Saturday, this update will be done on a Thursday or Friday evening, to allow for a weekend forecast and a look ahead to the next forecast week.

So as an Example this is the first blog, all future blogs will be posted to the Forecasting Blogs section with a link in here.

Saturday

Relatively mild conditions across much of the Alps, the freezing level above 3000m, generally dry and in most places sunny, so a decent day for Walking in the Alps as opposed to skiing.

Sunday

A similar sort of day to Saturday, looking very dry across the Alps with sunny spells, perhaps some even milder air moving in across Austria and Switzerland, taking the freezing level above 3500m for France and Switzerland, closer to 3000m for Austria and Italy.

Monday

Another dry and mild start to the day, with freezing levels close to 3500m for the Pyrenees, but edging down to between 2500-3000m for Northern Switzerland, However later in the day, a cold front is set to edge down from the north bringing some heavy precipitation. During the evening and overnight the cold front will bring some heavy precipitation through the Alps and this will give snow to increasingly lower levels by morning.

Tuesday

Much colder behind the cold front, with freezing levels between 1000-1500m for Northern parts of Switzerland, NW Austria, and much of France, in the range 1500-2000m for Southern Switzerland, Austria and Italy. after the cold front pushes away to the south in the early morning, there will be showers following on behind, with snow level around 1200m in France, Switzerland, rising up to 1700m in Italy.

Outlook

Remaining cold for the middle part of next week, with freezing levels below 1000m in France and western Switzerland, slightly higher further south and east, with continuing heavy precipitation in many areas, with snow fall down to below 800m in the west, closer to 1500m in other areas, with some higher resorts getting a decent base for the forthcoming especially with the severe frosts expected overnight in build to next weekend.

Some uncertainty after this but one or two signs of the cold Polar Maritime feed being cut off allowing somewhat milder weather to edge in the south.

Any queries or suggestions please let me know, and weather requests will be welcomed.

[boro_dave]

Fantastic idea Jackone! I'll certainly be keeping an eye out for these updates, fantastic to see that the alps could be in for their first real snow of the season next week.

I'm a very keen skier (although I cannot afford it too often!), and I'm hoping to make the trip out to Tignes in France at some point this winter, have been there twice before and can honestly say it is my favourite place in the entire world. So any updates on that resort in particular (or neighbouring Val d'Isere) would be greatly appreciated!

Not sure of the best place to look, but I've been trying to research on average what time of the year the alps usually see the first good snowfalls, if next week turns out well for them, would that be particularly early in comparison to some of the recent (often very late starting) years?

[johnholmes]

for many its the week leading up to, sometime the week after, Christmas, for the lower resorts, higher ones then any are almost fully open from about the end of the first week in December.

[xxx]

courchevel 1650 - out there from 27th december to 3rd jan - please let it snow, oh snow gods.

Edited October 25, 2008 by xxx

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

Hi Jackone

Saalbach Austria please. 10/1 to 17/1 is my holiday.

BFTP

[J10]

Saalbach has been added to my list of resorts.

[BLAST FROM THE PAST]

Saalbach has been added to my list of resorts.

Cheers Butt

BFTP

[johnholmes]

this link, I use for Wengen, gives an idea of what the Alps can expect over the coming days; for your own resort click on the relevant country then place

http://wetterstationen.meteomedia.de/messn...ast/067280.html

as below

http://wetterstationen.meteomedia.de/messnetz/

I find it as accurate as anything I've seen in all the time going to the Jungfrau region

of course that is not to say you should not be reading the weekly output from JackOne when he starts the regular updates for us all!

Edited October 27, 2008 by johnholmes

[smich]

Hi Jackone, looking forward to your blogs again this season.

Could you include Italy please. I'm off to the Dolomites over Xmas and they can have a very different scenario to the western Alps of France.

Here's to a good season. Looks like another bit of good early season cover - shame it's too early to last!

Steve M

[ukmoose]

Hi Jackone,

Very good of you to do this amongst the myriad of other things you do. - Off to Morzine in Feb so any updates for that area of France will be much appreciated. If you could arrange perfect, waist deep powder before hand and a week of sunshine and low temperatures while we're there - so much the better!

Thanks,

Moose

[mcboz]

Hi,

Can you add Val Thorens (new year) and Aple d'Huez (last week in Jan) to the list for me please. Looking forward to reading about lots of snow in the comming weeks!

I always find the ensembles for Tignes useful as a quick glance guide.... http://www.meteociel.fr/cartes_obs/gens_di...mp;ville=Tignes

Jamie

[frozencanals]

Hi Jack One

Excellent idea, for those looking for Tignes the official web site for Tigne has loads of webcams for up to the minute forcasts, watch the snow levels rise on the roof of thew wooden hut, it got to over a meter last year, got to http://www.tignes.net/

I would like to put in a plea for the Massif Central, around Le Mont Dore... closest skiing to home for me....

Cheers

FC

[Amanzi]

The family and I will be off to Chatel in France over the Christmas period. Please would you add this location to your list.

Many Thanks

[SuttonStorm]

Hi Jackone - thanks for doing this again. It was a wonderful addition last season in the exciting build-up to the hols.

We are going to Courchevel for the week before Xmas so looking for a big dump now, continuing until then! I am glad that euro-high has finally given way this week and will be looking at this HD web-cam with interest!

http://www.skivolution.co.uk/webcams_livecam.html

Regards

SS

[J10]

Hi Jackone,

Very good of you to do this amongst the myriad of other things you do. - Off to Morzine in Feb so any updates for that area of France will be much appreciated. If you could arrange perfect, waist deep powder before hand and a week of sunshine and low temperatures while we're there - so much the better!

Thanks,

Moose

Morzine Avoriaz is the only ski resort i have been to. I would certainty hope for better conditions than the ones I had, There is an excellent website www.morznet.com whihc has great webcams and shows the scene across the town of Morzine.

Current Resorts in the list

Courchevel

Chatel

Tignes

Val Thorens

Alpe d'Huez

Dolomites

Wengen

Saalbach

Morzine

[ukmoose]

Morzine Avoriaz is the only ski resort i have been to. I would certainty hope for better conditions than the ones I had, There is an excellent website www.morznet.com whihc has great webcams and shows the scene across the town of Morzine.

Current Resorts in the list

Courchevel

Chatel

Tignes

Val Thorens

Alpe d'Huez

Dolomites

Wengen

Saalbach

Morzine

Thanks for that Jackone - I'll check out the website. We did go to Morzine last year as well, The weather was beautiful all week with blue sky and sunshine everyday, if a little too warm for the lower slopes. Hardly any snow fell during the week - one light shower - much less than we have just had for the last two hours here in Buckingham in fact!

It would be nice to get a good base down but it's still a little early I guess.

Moose

[Amanzi]

Thanks JACKONE for adding Chatel for me. Could be an interesting experience for me....ever seen a 4 year old on skis??? I do hope we get some nice snow and of course the kids will be praying for a snowy christmas day (one can dream..or wishcast).

[J10]

Thanks for that Jackone - I'll check out the website. We did go to Morzine last year as well, The weather was beautiful all week with blue sky and sunshine everyday, if a little too warm for the lower slopes. Hardly any snow fell during the week - one light shower - much less than we have just had for the last two hours here in Buckingham in fact!

It would be nice to get a good base down but it's still a little early I guess.

Moose

A good start to the season with some snow in Avoriaz already.

[johnholmes]

ski report for the Downs and Chilterns tomorrow morning Julian?

[J10]

I will leave that to the locals.

[frozencanals]

Morning Folks

Taking a quick tour of my fav skiing webcams I see that Tignes in the Alps, Gourette in the Pyrenees, Levi in Finland and even the good old Ptarmigan in Scotland are all showing thier first major snow of the year, hopefully it will stick around and give us a bumper year. Only Le Mont Dore in the Massif Central has missed out on my list, but then it is pretty low.

Here's to a great skiing season..

Cheers

FC

Edited October 29, 2008 by frozencanals

[Alister]

I'm off to Avoriaz on the 23rd Jan for a week so I'm praying for good snow on the Portes Du Soliel as well. Avoriaz had a good fall a few weeks ago, but then temps in the 20's put paid to an early base. There have fresh falls yesterday & overnight with some more to come, but with a Fohen wind forecast over the weekend I wouldn't be suprised to see bare slope by Monday! That said it's still early and if Avoriaz is anyting like last season all will be well!

[connlach]

Hi Jack One

You were kindly including Oberhof in the German middle mountains last year for me. Is is possible to still consider German resorts as I am planning on visiting reguarily this year?

Many Thanks

[J10]

Hi Jack One

You were kindly including Oberhof in the German middle mountains last year for me. Is is possible to still consider German resorts as I am planning on visiting reguarily this year?

Many Thanks

Yes

[frozencanals]

Morning all

Just made my tour of snow cams in my favourite ski areas, and to complete my set it has started snowing in the Massif Central according to the webcams at Le Mont Dore, so we may be able to get a snow fix at Christmas, though there is a lot of weather to come and go between now and then. It is still snowing in the Alps, certainly in the area around Tignes and the Pyrenees in the Gourette area. The good burghers of Gourette have put up a live cam so you can see the snow falling.

Cheers

FC