I've booked a ski vacation at sauze d'oulx for the 11th of January.
It seems via lattea didn't have the best season opening so far...
For now it's 50cm up and 30cm at the valley.
The upcoming week and a half seems pretty hot with temperatures reaching 10 Celsius degrees on Monday.
Some sites with 14 days forecast claim there's gonna be some snow at the 6th of Jan, but as far as I know it's not something I can rely on...
On top of all, I can cancel my hotel reservation only until tommorow evening.
Do you think I should consider changing resort?
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
If you've gots somewhere that you like the look of and it guaranteed snow then yes.
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?
They currently have 230kms of skiing open so
I suspect they have a decent base on their runs.
Despite warm temps the air will be dry this week so they are unlikely to lose too much snow. The sun is also weak at this time of year. Any recent condition reports ?
Have a look at the 3b meteo website - it’s a local forecaster with seems pretty reliable to me. When I last looked, they were expecting some in the first week of Jan.
I see the temperatures are falling (v cold at night) so even if the real snow doesn’t arrive, the snow cannons will be on I would have thought. I expect the snow will be good above mid station. Sestriere looks good all the way down to town. Even Borgata looks fine and that is about the lowest point on the Sestriere side.
If you avoid the lowest slopes or those on the south side of Frative, I expect you will find decent conditions.
Good luck, have fun.
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
@yorkshirelad, Champoluc looked like it had resaonable snowmn the village (!) pre-xmas... did they get the rain too?
After all it is free
After all it is free
mmmm . . .skied Sauz last season last week Jan . . they'd had a 'dump' the week prior so I assumed all would be great - not the case as the base was sheet ice and the top surface (snow cannons) scraped away very quickly during the course of a day . . .nip up the road to Montgenevre if you can . . .
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I'm actually in a similar situation. Sauze booked from 20th and can get a full refund on accommodation up to a week ahead. Flights booked to/from Turin and they can't be changed. So it's a waiting game... 20th is a way off yet so hopefully things will improve but as time goes on I might consider changing to somewhere like Cervinia. It's just a question of how late to leave it and yet still stand a chance of finding reasonable accommodation.
This is a local report from yesterday. Looks ok on the upper mountain and artificial low down. I expect Sestriere and Montgenevre will not need the artificial snow, but Sauze itself is a bit lower.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
In Sauze this week. Snow up top is ok, if a little hard, but low down is very poor. Skiing down to Clotes was hell. Very busy, narrow strip of artificial snow that was rather Icy and mogulled.
Some good skiing to be had - the blacks at the top of Sanscicario were in excellent nick and had remarkably few folks on them.
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.
paste URL into translate.google.com for machine translation
So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
It’s xmas week. What would one expect?
You know it makes sense.
You know it makes sense.
under a new name wrote:
It’s xmas week. What would one expect?
A different answer, for a start.
It's a friendly forum, people ask in order to get helpful answers and not to be taught how stupid are they.
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
@drporat, my point is only that, expectations of marvellous snow into resort are unrealistic at this time of year unless you work in the marketing department at Inghams.
Poster: A snowHead
Poster: A snowHead
We have marvellous snow in Austria right now. Just saying...
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Queenie, stop making us jealous
In Verbier is amazing as well, BTW
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?
@drporat, I bet it is! Chamonix is pretty good for xmas week.
@Sort26, what did you do in the end? Accom for Jan 11 shouldn't be hard to find if you did cancel.
Hi all!
Thanks a lot for all the information it was really helpful
We decided not to cancel after all (the hotel was to good XD) ... It seems that the forecasts were correct and no snow till we get there, but I hope conditions up the mountain (2000m & up) will be OK...
We are still considering if there's an option to have a few days at montgenevre which has way better conditions
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
No one can predict the weather and an overnight dump wherever you are transforms things immediately. We are in that domain one week later than you but i'm not too worried and neither should you be. The temperature just needs to drop then the lower slopes will be covered.
I wish you good luck and hope you'll have a wonderful time.
IMHO the hotel is less important, besides its location of course.
The most important thing TO ME are the pistes. And it's correlated to your group's ski level.
I only ski on-piste, all colours and all conditions. I love it too much so I can't afford to be too pretentious. I have sharp edges that allow me to go anywhere. I even enjoy the hard man-made snow that allows me to enjoy Austria (Solden) in november and EK in early December (PSB).
The problem appears when there is no natural snow to top it up and it's sunny. Then you'll ski on hard icy and slippery pistes
I see it in the 4 Vallées in the last days. Amazing blue skies and warm temperatures during the day followed by freezing nights.
All the fun reds and blacks are frozen. You could skate on Combatseline (red) today, it was tougher than upper blacks.
This is why i try to reach places as snowy as possible. Montgenevre is known for that.
Again, best wishes and have fun!
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Heading out to Sauze this weekend- anybody out there at the moment and can report on the snow?
After all it is free
After all it is free
I just got back, just before New Years. They weren't able to turn on snow cannons, in needs to be -4.
That said, Sportina and higher was fine. Decent coverage, sure some pebbles showing through here and there. The bowl was nice. I guess it depends on how much the sun was shinning and how much they are losing. Was over in Sansicario and Sestriere, Sauze was in the best shape.
I don't think it's bad enough to cancel, but it's not good enough to book, if you hadn't already booked.
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Sounds good, thanks very much. Apparently a dump of snow is due on Wednesday.
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Ski the Net with snowHeads
I have friends there at the moment. They report that skiing is great. No real issues. Skied to Claviere, Montgenevre etc great days out.....
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
Just finished my week in Sauze. The cannons have been on the past 2 nights and they have helped considerably. Quite a few patches of ice and plenty of hard stuff in the morning, but generally softening up nicely by lunch.
Many lower runs are either pure artificial or very thin and quite a few pebbles around. Having said that, we've had a good week and have found plenty of decent snow to ski. Posted maintenance are doing a good job at ekeing out the snow. It'll really benefit from a foot or two of fresh, but fun still there to have!
Sestriere has rather more snow thanks to the extra height and we've enjoyed going over there. The cold temps the past two nights have meant the pistes there were rather hard this morning, albeit again helped by the artificial where it had been made. Again, plenty open and some good skiing to be had.
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.
Sort26 - hows it going? From the nearby a Prali webcam (http://www.praliskiarea.com) it looks like it’s snowing there tonight. Hope you get some benefit from it.
So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
We just finished our ski vacation
And It was a really good! We aventually rent a car and went for 3 days at claviere and montgenevre, 2 at sauze and 1 at sestriere. The area is amazing and has some great skiing even after a month with no snow!
The snow at montgenevre and clavi is better without doubt, but there is still a lot of skiing to be done at sauze and sestriere. Quite icy throughout all vialattea (we think that sestriere has most ice and patchy snow).
It also should be noted that currently the connections from sansicario and sestri are only throu black runs...
You know it makes sense.
You know it makes sense.
Great report, thanks! Very glad you had a good time.
Any news on when the Fratieve links will reopen?
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
@Sort26, thanks for that info as we are heading out to san sicario on Saturday and were wondering how the pistes were holding up.
Looks like Wepowder’s snow did arrive but was mainly in southern Piedmont- 60cm reported in a Prato Nevoso. I saw snow on the webcams in Via Lattea but it looked like 5-10cm down near the town. Perhaps a bit more down in a Prali? Difficult to see.
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Just back from a week there stayed in Cesana and overall the pistes were fine.
Had a little snow on Weds but it barely made a difference although it’s always nicer views after a snow fall.
All I would say is the steeper runs home become very scratchy at the end of the day so if you’re the nervous type download.
Also the only link back into Sauze is a longish black and on our exit out of Sauze on the chair above this piste looking down it was carnage with skiers returning back to Sauze without the skills to ski down safely. We could not understand why there wasn’t an option to take the chair back or why alternate piste weren’t open as there is plenty of cover.
We skied everywhere in the domain and would say that Montgenèvre has the nicest snow and runs but the pistes generally are on the firm side all over but very skiable. Wall to wall blue skies with fantastic views, great food and wine at very pleasant prices.
Looks like snow coming in the forecast.
Enjoy, Greg.
After all it is free
After all it is free
Glad you had a good trip.
I read somewhere that there was a serious accident that meant a red and blue from the top were closed, leaving a black as the only option. I wonder if what you describe is as a result of that? Hopefully they will reopen soon, but Italian judicial investigations seem to have the power to close pistes for as long as it takes.
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We saw the aftermath at that incident on New Year's week. Apparently a 9 year old girl lost control, collided with a wooden wind break off the piste and subsequently died. Not surprised that pistes are thus closed as a result. This all happened on the red off the top. We'd seen this run from the top and it had looked in poor condition then. The black, at that point, was much nicer although I can imagine the carnage if everyone is using it.
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Ski the Net with snowHeads
That’s incredibly sad. My youngest skied that piste last year, aged 9, and I can’t imagine how awful it would have been if she had been in the place of that poor girl.
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