A few pictures from touring at the weekend. Still almost full cover above 1,000 meters , with some snow down to about 700m.

 bob

 As promised we are going to be skiing into May, but for how long depends on our customers as much as the weather - if we get interest from skiers and boarders we will just stay open that bit longer.

We have put together a celebration week end for the May bank holiday including some great lift pass offers and activities-(ski for £9.25), this is our way of saying thank you to both our local community and our skiing/boarding community. The other way we can also say thanks to regular skiers/season pass holders is to try and remain open to allow everyone to enjoy a bit more spring skiing, although the numbers will inevitably drop off. It would be easy to pull the plug on it, but we don’t want to do this –it sends out the wrong message about our commitment to Skiing and our commitment to our loyal customers, nevertheless we will have to make a realistic decision at some stage, so much depends on unknowns – the weather and the interest.

I want to take this opportunity to publicly thank two key managers who will be leaving in May.  Firstly John McBean who has been heading up out technical maintenance department and secondly John McMorran who has been our safety manager and I know a popular point of contact for our winter customers.  I also want to acknowledge the efforts of all our seasonal staff, and finally our volunteer ambassadors, from the feedback I receive they really do make difference to our visitors experience on Cairn Gorm.   We believe our staff are our greatest asset and we work very hard on trying to be customer focused in what can be a very unpredictable and rapidly changing, sometimes even very challenging situation.  I am sometimes amazed by what can be achieved, against the odds, up here and that comes from a real commitment by staff to the Mountain. It does not always work – but with so many variables that’s inevitable. As with all successful organizations we strive for continual improvement and we are now taking the opportunity to review our internal structures. An important part of this includes taking into consideration your feedback and comments –can I thank those of you who have taken the opportunity to provide us with constructive feedback. - It is valued and welcome..

Not over yet… sunshine and lower winds forecast for Sunday and snow  .. So if you can get fuel …..

Bob      

Last weekend was the busiest of the season and we are now up to 60,000 skier days. Probably the first time ever that the busiest weekend has been so late in the season. Normally the busiest weekend of any season is the first weekend that we have good snow cover – early snow is always very popular – and this often means we are still gearing up the winter team so inevitably there are teething issues. By this time of year most aspects run smoothly, but we have had to recruit additional team members to fill the gaps of those committed to other summer jobs. Today we even started two new lift operators – and last week my daughter joined the team as a lift operator for four days!

Our marketing/PR team have been putting in a lot of effort to maximise the PR impact of the great conditions we have been experiencing. We really did get a lot of coverage for Scottish skiing including national TV and radio, the front page of national papers and a lot of regional coverage. This will create more confidence in the Scottish ski market for next season.- which has to be agood thing for the industry, our local community and Scottish skiers generally.

The weather is now on the change and I can already hear the wind blowing outside - but the forecast is for it to revert to colder conditions next week and we still expect to keep a base in the main gullies for a while yet. We plan to change to summer hours next Monday – opening from 10am with a reduced day pass price and I am still hopeful there will be a few good skiing days to come.

In recent years there has been quite a lot of doom and gloom about the impact of climate change on Scottish skiing, yet even the most pessimistic of predictions still suggest we will get snow in the Scottish mountains in the next few years and what we have just experienced only helps to confirm this.

At the recent Fifth World Conference of Snow and Mountain Tourism held in March this year Peter Keller, Director of the Lausanne University Institute of Tourism and Director of Switzerland Tourism Services, summarised the most important conclusions of the Conference. He affirmed that global warming was first recorded in 1955 and that it is caused principally by daily human habits. “This century, we await a 1º C -4º C increase in temperature. Following the 100-day rule, the current total of 609 ski resorts that exist today will drop to 500 by the year 2020, to 404 in 2050, and to 202 resorts by the end of century, all of which will be in Austria, Switzerland, France, Germany and Italy”, reported Keller. For those remaining resorts, the greenhouse effect will have to be stabilised by 2050. Gas emissions must be reduced and new renewable energy technologies encouraged. Keller concluded that climate change is a process that has been developing for some time, adding that companies and their objectives must therefore adapt to its requirements and consequences.

What does this mean for Cairn Gorm ? Quite simply – we are still in the snow business, but we need to continue our strategy of developing a business model that can take advantage of the snow when we get it, but does not rely totally on snow when it is not here. We do have a responsibility to ensure our activities on the mountain are sustainable so as to allow future generations to enjoy what we have; this means we do need to take on our global responsibilities in terms of emissions…yes, its challenge…but that’s life!

Bob

We are enjoying the most extraordinary conditions here at the moment. I  Left the office at 6pm and set off into the mountains for a couple of hours ski touring - had the mountains to myself apart from this mountain hare.

Bob

Conditions still getting better by the day .. the pictures tell the story!

Helen Rennie , one of our ambassadors sent me this unusual photo taken on the White lady this week( Ok - so the fact there is snow on the White Lady is unusual anyway)!  

 The reality is that “smooth, trouble free operation” and “Scottish ski area” is a contradiction in terms.  In the early blogs this year, I explained some of the challenges that make the simple comparison with Alpine resorts  totally inappropriate, but the most challenging times for any ski business are the beginning and end of the season.  Contrary to the usual annual rumour - we have no fixed plans about closing for skiing - we just react to the conditions and although the official end to the season has always been the end of April, if we have snow and skiers, we just keep going. There just comes a point when the number of skiing customers and the costs of operating don’t stack up and we are forced to pull the plug. This approach has its challenges. Some of our winter seasonal staff have already moved on to pre-planned summer activities/jobs and others will be leaving soon. Staffing changes always impacts on operations. With CairnGorm  Mountain being a year-round business, there is never a perfect time for the permanent team to take holidays, but after Easter is normally quieter and an opportunity for a few to escape to the Alps. In a couple of weeks, delegates will be attending the annual trade ski area conference in Grenoble. Our corporate hospitality team has already held our first wedding at Drumintoul Lodge last week-end with 150 guests….  Quite chilly in a marquee, and a lot of work.  This year we have had to delay some of our summer preparations although we have a major schedule of summer works to get through. But, to put all this in perspective, we are delighted we are still able to offer good skiing.                       Bob     

We have now been asked to keep the Ptarmigan tow closed while the investigations are  on going - we hope this will only be for a couple of days. I am told the Crash site is a few hundred meters above the Ptarmigan tow return wheel. We are still getting very heavy snow here – but with light winds- almost alpine! I have added some more pictures which were taken by mountain rescue team members on Sunday .You may have seen reported over the week end that a plane crashed somewhere near to Cairn Gorm . This was outside the ski patrolled area , but we have been providing  the rescue team and emergency services with  support as well as assessing any potential pollution issues.

I thought I would share with you the view from my window this morning (Saturday 5^th April).  As you can see we are back to full winter up here. We did loose some snow during the week , but the forecast is now to stay cold on the hill for the next few days and once again  we have a good base of snow in the main gullies  and therefore we should be able to provide some good skiing  as long as the wind does not get up too much.

We opened for skiing on 1^st December and it now looks increasingly likely that we will be able to ski into our 6th Month – May.    With our artic, rather than alpine climate, Scotland traditionally has a long season, but in recent years Spring has tended to come early- not this year!  I think I will keep the plants inside for a bit longer yet.

 Bob