 Poster: A snowHead
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[quote="Winterhighland"]
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| With an IDE snow maker the 'old rules simply don't apply anymore'. So surely you take the snow to the population, not stick to the old rule of the population travelling to the snow? |
It would be interesting to see how the surface of the snow that they made in Pitzal/Zermatt holds up to the glaring sun without being topped up.
when snow subliminates, is good snow left behind?
IF that was the case, then without the melting and re-freezing that you would get at altitude, the IDE-made snow would hopefully stay skiiable and would just need topping up.
I wasn't sure if this was the case so if it was at cross fell, it would probably get a sprinkling of new snow a couple of times a week during the winter, thus keeping it fresh.
If it was located further south, it would only get covered with fresh snow 10 or so times a year.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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| moffatross wrote: |
It amazes me how many people complain at paying £30 for 400 to 500m of lift served vertical and 20 to 30 km of runs with only a 2 hour drive to get there.  |
are these Scottish people complaining?
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If it costs money, somewhere there'll be a Scottish person complaining.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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^ I'm just as serious as you are! 
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I certainly wouldn't complain at the cost of Scottish lift passes. Compared to an indoor fridge, which I do visit on occasion, it's pretty good value for money. However, the cost of getting there and staying there puts it in direct competition with a package trip to the Alps.
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queen bodecia, in the Scotland Weekend thread someone posted up their combined cost for Travel (including ski bus to the mountain), Accommodation and 2 day lift pass was £225, without any time of work for a full 2 days skiing. Can anyone come up with a no time of work solution for that budget for the Alps? The sleeper has a distinct advantage of not having to faff about with Airport security and airline luggage restrictions.
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queen bodecia, it was Cathy who calculated the costs for this weekend gone in the Skiing at Cairngorm, Scotland for the weekend thread:
| cathy wrote: |
The cost
As a weekend trip from London this is what it would have cost, if we managed to get the cheapest priced sleeper berths. Some of our group did manage this.....
£120 – return on the sleeper train with a berth. Would be £60 for a reclining seat.
£38 – B&B accommodation for one night and an additional breakfast the morning we arrived
£58 – lift pass for 2 days
£7 – ski bus for 2 days
£115 – approximate spending money for drinks & meals, including in London before the train left.
Total – approximately £340 for the weekend’s skiing. |
Leaving aside the spend on drinks and meals that's £225 as Winterhighland says - probably cheaper in Chalet Melezes pre-season but pretty good value IMHO particularly given Cathy reckons "the condition of the snow was better in Cairngorm than in the Skiwelt a few weeks previously", remembering Austria has overall had a better season snow wise than France that's quite a plaudit IMHO!
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Sadly it's not that cheap from the Midlands. You can fly from Birmingham to Inverness but it's generally around £200 return. Trains seem horribly awkward involving many changes and around 10 hours each way, I daren't look at the cost. Even when some friends drove up for a weekend last year it worked out at around £300 per head, before spending money.
I had a 4-day ski trip to Austria earlier in the year for £360 all in.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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| queen bodecia wrote: |
| Even when some friends drove up for a weekend last year it worked out at around £300 per head, before spending money. |
Not sure what point you were making 
Derby - Cairngorm = 840 miles return = say £150 on fuel. Assuming it was 2 friends in one car, they must have spent the other £225 each on something other than travelling.
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moffatross, the point I was making is that the cost is roughly similar for a budget 4-day trip to the Alps when compared with a long weekend in Scotland (I think they skied for 3 days and the cost quoted was for travel, accommodation, food and lift passes). Don't get me wrong, I'd love to do Scotland one day when cost, transport timings and booking way in advance aren't my first considerations. At present they are.
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You know it makes sense.
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| mr_big_ad wrote: |
so if it was at cross fell, it would probably get a sprinkling of new snow a couple of times a week during the winter, thus keeping it fresh.
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Hmmm, as somebody who was fairly addicted to checking the Yad Moss webcam (bit lower, c.4miles away?) thrice daily all this winter I can assure you that was not the case. Highly erratic. Huge dumps, then weeks of nothing.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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queen bodecia, since I've taken this thread completely off topic I might as well keep going now! 
It looks from a quick trawl of ScotRail's site that you can do Derby->Aviemore using the Sleeper from Crewe with just the single change in Crewe onto / off the Sleeper. The National Rail database system has gone down for overnight work so that's ended me playing about with that... Don't know where you are in relation to Derby though, but there are quite a lot of places that can connect into the Sleeper reasonably well.
Advantage of the Sleeper is that your travelling overnight, so it also takes care of a couple of nights hotel accommodation - it's possible to get a full weekend skiing with just one night of accommodation required.
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Poster: A snowHead
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queen bodecia, OK I get you,  they spent £100 a day all in (except for beer money) for a long weekend trip they probably didn't have to plan much ahead for and may only have cost them one day of holiday from work.
Based on my week in Austria in 10 days time, that actually compares quite favourably with a prebooked TO package to the Alps at say £600 per week per person (hotel/catered chalet) including food plus a lift pass at around £200, plus ski carriage at say £30, plus taxi rides or a week of car parking at the airport of say £20 per person = £850 (or £140 per day all in except beer money) for 6 days skiing and at a cost of 5 days holiday from work.
To my mind then, the argument that going to the Alps is cheaper doesn't really stack up. For some people, Scotland may sometimes be as (or nearly as) expensive as the Alps but if what's nagging them in their heart of hearts, is that they think it's going to be a bit crap because they won't get so many miles in, it won't feel like they're 'abroad' and the sun won't shine very much, then they're probably right and they're destined to be disappointed anyway.
On the other hand, if they embark on it in the full expectation that the whole experience will feel very different to the European Alps model of skiing, in many ways, more earthy and honest and if they go in the full knowledge that the mileage (per ski resort) is more limited, that the weather is likely to be 'Scottish' and the culture very British, they'll likely love it and want to go back. 
Anyway, I really hope if you want to, that you get the chance to try Scotland at some point. You may just find yourself thinking that it's different to Austria & France etc, not better or worse, and enjoying it all the more for that.  I've looked through all my tickets for 2010/2011 this evening and found I've so far skied 17 days for the 2010/2011 season (and another 3 days of touring) but I'm still looking forward to my Eurotrip mainly because of the difference in the social aspect of 'being away'. It won't make me think that having a day or two more in Scotland when I get back (if the snow's still here of course) is not worthwhile in comparison.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Winterhighland, trains from Nottingham or Sheffield are easier for me. Derby station I'd have to drive to and pay for parking. I looked into it when Cathy first suggested her 'bash'. I couldn't find any sleeper train options, it looked like being daytime trains via York and possibly Edinburgh, return fare starting at £142. Driving would have worked out slightly cheaper and about a similar travel time (7-8 hours), plus 3 nights' accommodation, one full day and two half days off work, and it looked less and less feasible.
Like I said, the notion of skiing on homegrown snow does appeal to me and I really enjoyed my trip to Another World when we had good snow in Yorkshire, an easy day trip from here. But at present, it makes more sense for me to take a week off work, book a package trip and get as much ski time as possible for my money. Going to Scotland raises issues of long travel time (7-8 hours when flying to the Alps takes 5-6), still need to take a fair bit of time off work, plus I have to plan my holidays months in advance which throws up the possibilities of bad conditions in Scotland.
But it's on my to do list, maybe one day when I'm less of a wage slave. 
Anyway, back to the original topic...
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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just out of interest
should anyone be able to attain an April 1st 1989 Daily Telegraph, there was an article in there about a ski resort at Boot in the Eskdale valley Cumbria
artist impression showed a chair lift from the village centre to snow covered slopes.
but it was April Fools day
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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| cockerhoop wrote: |
just out of interest
should anyone be able to attain an April 1st 1989 Daily Telegraph, there was an article in there about a ski resort at Boot in the Eskdale valley Cumbria
artist impression showed a chair lift from the village centre to snow covered slopes.
but it was April Fools day |
I read that article, the slopes all faced the wrong way though.
I'll be telling you all i've got funding for my idea tomorrow!
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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| wigan wrote: |
| mr_big_ad wrote: |
so if it was at cross fell, it would probably get a sprinkling of new snow a couple of times a week during the winter, thus keeping it fresh.
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Hmmm, as somebody who was fairly addicted to checking the Yad Moss webcam (bit lower, c.4miles away?) thrice daily all this winter I can assure you that was not the case. Highly erratic. Huge dumps, then weeks of nothing. |
I believe the inclrease in elevation of 200m would make a significant difference when it is borderline between rain and snow which for a lot of the weather fronts coming from the west it would be at 500-1000m during the winter.
Raise have a webcam that you can look back on. Raise is at a similar elevation to cross fell, but much more coastal.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/raise_up_dated_pics/
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| mr_big_ad wrote: |
I read that article, the slopes all faced the wrong way though.
I'll be telling you all i've got funding for my idea tomorrow! |
If you get funding for this, please let me know where from. Because I've got a great idea - dog toothbrushes. All I need is £250K and no questions asked. It fixes the problem we all have using our own toothbrush on our dog. How many dog owners are there in the country? Millions. We could be rich, just need to get into Tescos, Sainsbury's and the like. We won't sell to Asda though, the pikeys will screw us to the ground on price. Naturally I will be taking a salary from day one, of approximately £100K per year.
See how ridiculous I sound? You sound the same to us.
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| mr_big_ad wrote: |
| I believe the inclrease in elevation of 200m would make a significant difference when it is borderline between rain and snow which for a lot of the weather fronts coming from the west it would be at 500-1000m during the winter. |
Although that's generally true, this winter, latitude has been much more important than altitude. The Highlands have had pretty much constant snow cover down to 500-600 metres on NE aspects while the cover in the Southern Uplands of Scotland, the Lake District fells and North Pennines of England has been erratic even on their summits at between 800 and 1,000 metres.
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| Monium wrote: |
| mr_big_ad wrote: |
I read that article, the slopes all faced the wrong way though.
I'll be telling you all i've got funding for my idea tomorrow! |
Naturally I will be taking a salary from day one, of approximately £100K per year.
See how ridiculous I sound? You sound the same to us. |
You sound bonkers Monium, only 100K for a top idea like that, which lets face it is both more likely and more commercially viable.
Oh, it alreadys exists
http://www.canineconcepts.co.uk/item--Dog-Toothbrush--toothbrush
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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| Monium wrote: |
| See how ridiculous I sound? You sound the same to us. |
do you wannt hear about my fanless data centre cooling design and my electricity generating solar thermal collector?
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| mr_big_ad wrote: |
| Monium wrote: |
| See how ridiculous I sound? You sound the same to us. |
do you wannt hear about my fanless data centre cooling design and my electricity generating solar thermal collector? |
Fanless data centre cooling and solar panels already exist. These products are a good idea. Your idea is not a good product.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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| Monium wrote: |
| mr_big_ad wrote: |
| Monium wrote: |
| See how ridiculous I sound? You sound the same to us. |
do you wannt hear about my fanless data centre cooling design and my electricity generating solar thermal collector? |
Fanless data centre cooling and solar panels already exist. These products are a good idea. Your idea is not a good product. |
you are clearly an overly negative person, from what i wrote, you could not have established that my plans were not radicaly improvement on currect technology!
remember the hoover, who thought that could be improved on? one man, James Dyson, we meet up on wedneday evenings for a drink and i supply him with great ideas, trouble is, he doesn't ski!
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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mr_big_ad, I am inspired by your idea. Here are my plans for the Hampstead Heath ski area only 100 yards from my house in London:
And that's just the upper lift.
Wow, this is going to be really good. (I'm expecting your idea to much improve on the natural snow in this photo!)
Last edited by And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports. on Thu 31-03-11 12:41; edited 2 times in total
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snowball, you can be executive vice president of the resort and live in a castle at the bottom of the red run for you efforts!
Truly inspirational!
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You know it makes sense.
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| snowball wrote: |
mr_big_ad, I am inspired by your idea. Here are my plans for the Hampstead Heath ski area only 100 yards from my house in London:
Wow, this is going to be really good. I just need to raise the money! |
This looks shopped. I can tell from some of the pixels and from seeing quite a few shops in my time.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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mr_big_ad, thank you, I am now planning the castle. I shall not need a large one since it is so near to my house but I am thinking of basing it on Chambord in the Loire valley. Mr Technique, I have no objection to a few of your shops near my castle, or even a farm so I can get really fresh eggs.
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Poster: A snowHead
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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snowball, you are Captain Haddock and I claim my £5.00
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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| mr_big_ad wrote: |
you are clearly an overly negative person, from what i wrote, you could not have established that my plans were not radicaly improvement on currect technology!
remember the hoover, who thought that could be improved on? one man, James Dyson, we meet up on wedneday evenings for a drink and i supply him with great ideas, trouble is, he doesn't ski! |
Has he not considered investing in your snowpark? or is he only after ideas and products that work?
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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| moffatross wrote: |
| mr_big_ad wrote: |
| I believe the inclrease in elevation of 200m would make a significant difference when it is borderline between rain and snow which for a lot of the weather fronts coming from the west it would be at 500-1000m during the winter. |
Although that's generally true, this winter, latitude has been much more important than altitude. The Highlands have had pretty much constant snow cover down to 500-600 metres on NE aspects while the cover in the Southern Uplands of Scotland, the Lake District fells and North Pennines of England has been erratic even on their summits at between 800 and 1,000 metres. |
is there some sort of blocking pattern that is also stopping precipitation getting to the northern alpine resorts?
Italy has has a good year for snow i think, as they were not blocked from getting much snow.
from Wikepedia...
February 2011This was a very mild month (the 9th mildest in the last 100 years [45]) with very little frost and much of the country having its first snow-free February since 1998. The only wintry weather came on the 18-19th when rain turned to snow over parts of the Pennines and Yorkshire.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_of_2010-2011_in_Great_Britain_and_Ireland
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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No ones mentioned Otley and The Chevin. There was a semi-serious proposal some years ago to put a chair lift up it for summer tourism purposes. But it would also open up some interesting skiing if backed by a little snow making.
It ticks most of the boxes, 200m appx of vertical, north facing, keeps the snow for a lot longer than the rest of the area, normally has 2-3 skiable days a year already, large prosperous urban populations close by, 5 minutes from my house(!), open area at top, wooded runs below.
I have actually skied from Surprise View to the White House, but it's a b***er of a climb back up.
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I am afraid my plans for Hampstead Peaks has hit a few snags.
I was sourcing toilet roll holders for the castle when Camden Council got back to me with the news that in line with the other cuts in the borough I would have to cut 20% off my ski lifts. This means they wouldn't reach the top of the hill, which would be a real pity since the top should have the best snow-retaining climate, and it would also mean a bit of a walk to access the off-piste off the back.
Also some Hampstead residents in their usual petty, NIMBY way have objected that the extra height of Hampstead Hill/Mountain will mean that elderly residents with no transport of their own will find it harder to visit their friends in Belsize Park, let alone Chalk Farm.
Really, have these people no vision!
Last edited by After all it is free  on Thu 31-03-11 14:26; edited 2 times in total
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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