Resorts that are not snow sure in March

A snowHead

Another thread got me thinking, which big resorts are not snow sure in mid march?

by which i mean, youd think ooo theres a reasonable chance that there wont be more than a small percentage of lifts open and brown runs. I'm struggling to think of any with modern snowmaking and investment. (Big = >75km runs)

A snowHead

I had friends who went to the ski Welt in March and said the conditions were awful and wouldn't return.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

I reckon some in the far southern Alps which rely on erratic storms coming up from the south. They would be great in March some years, but poor in others. Valberg, Prato Nevoso spring to mind. Also maybe Villard-de-Lans Correncon in the far western Alps.

Perhaps the same would go for some places in the Italian Apennines or Pyrenees.

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My first trip to Zell Am see was a dry out with virtually no snow in the first week of March. Albeit this was 33 years ago and snow making has advanced significantly since then.

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Valloire also can be very hit and miss mid March.

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Frankly - pretty much anywhere with skiing below 2500m. The only guarantee is somewhere with a glacier. My maxim is the later in the season the higher I go. It is not only the risk of scarce snow, but even more poor/slushy pistes and no off-piste that you should consider.

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After all it is free

Mid March used to be a favourite time for me to go, over recent years we have tended to have more of a Feb / April split. But I always used to reckon if I was booking well in advance I would try and get somewhere with a decent amount of north facing skiing and a reasonable amount over 2,000m, though I was never too bothered what the base elevation was, that worked pretty well for me.

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@RedandWhiteFlachau, the question related to “snow sure”. In general you are right conditions are normally good in March. But that is not quite the same thing is it?

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March is the best month to ski.

I always go, often twice, and have literally never had 'bad' conditions and only in south facing places like Crans Montana have had to download from a mid-station.

Whereas I haven't had poor conditions throughout a resort, people who I know and trust say they have done. I have had poor conditions in pats of a ski area at that time, which is why I stick to the criteria above. I personally wouldn't go somewhere that didn't have a reasonable amount of North or northish facing skiing if I was booking well in advance. I have seen a lot of very warm days in March down the years.

You know it makes sense.

I can't think of a single 'destination resort' (ie excluding the tiny places like Rangger Kopfl etc) in Austria that isn't snow sure until well after the lifts close each season. Touring season continues on well past closing day.

Sure, places like the SkiWelt can get slushy in March, but if it's 20°C there in mid March it's also going to be +10°C and slushy at 3000m too. Lots of people who get unlucky during their week away somewhere seem not to realise that the weather/conditions are likely to be very similar in other places at that point too and that it's not a resort specific problem - like we saw at Christmas this year.

And heavy snowfall to the valley is very normal and common in March (and April) too, so don't be wishing away those trees to quickly...

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

This question doesn't really make sense. As we have recently seen, some quite major resorts were not "snowsure" in early January. The thing is that weather changes from week to week, and that the climate is changing over a longer period, and that disregarding any other factors, the aspect of slopes makes a big difference - a bigger difference as the hours of sunshine get longer. Reliance on snowmaking only works when temperatures are low enough.

Looking for a formula to determine in advance "where should I go skiing this January/February/March? is a bit of a mug's game. We all know perfectly well that Tignes will have more reliable snow than Morzine, at just about any time. Beyond that, "it all depends".

I spent March in a domaine topping out at 1960m for 15 years on the trot and there was always skiing available. One thing I learnt that the depth of the much-vaunted"base" was surprisingly irrelevant as the season wore on. It doesn't matter if there is a metre of snow - you are only skiing on the top few inches and if the weather is warm and sunny it will get slushy. Slushy is OK but that "elephant snot" really sticky snow is horrible.

A snowHead

@denfinella,

A snowHead

@pam w, the question is posed for discussion not because of a search for fact or even advice.

On another thread a snowhead did ask for advice on where to go - one of their criteria was "snowsure" in march, i couldnt think of any "destination" resort that wouldn't be..

For sure you can have a bad weather week that may limit things, wind, snow, warm, cold; its an outdoor pursuit after all, but will there be on piste snow?

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

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Having had a think about this, we've been to I think 4 places in March.

Last year Pila was a bit knackered by the end of March given the terrible season, but pretty much every run which had been open above the village except Couis 1 was still open. The runs below (with snow cannons) plus grimondet (without snow cannons) were not open for the whole season. Most of the runs were ice in the morning and actual lakes in the afternoon.

Ski welt mid-March was fantastic; snow all over the place (it dumped snow the days before we arrived), coldish temps and the only knackered run was the notorious Brixen home run.

Garmisch late-March was also great; the lower bits of the home runs were a bit brown but otherwise everything open and fun to ski.

La Plagne mid-March, we stayed in 1800 and most runs below this were shut except the connecting runs. Slush fest except very high up. Still, mssive area so plenty open.

So, I would have expected the higher areas to last better, but actually I think the snow making and temps in the Ski Welt and Garmisch meant that they were more 'snow sure'. Also luck, recent snow fall... think I'm with @hobbiteater on this on. Depending on the year or even the week 'snow sure' perception will differ.

I'd also say that I prefer a slushy piste with no people on it than a really busy piste with a hard base, so maybe it's a little bit horses for courses... the Ski Welt and Garmisch were both super quiet at that time of year!

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@under a new name, the OP defined "big" as ">75km of runs". Valberg claims 90km, hence its inclusion.

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A bit of a weird question.

First of all it said snow sure in March, the month with probably the greatest depth of snow. Perhaps asking for those in April would be more useful

Then it said >= 75km of piste. Looking through the reported piste lengths in https://www.skiresort.info/ski-resorts/europe/page/2/sorted/slope-length/ I see that the first resort below that length is Savognin with only 12 lifts (no, I've never been there either). There are 98 bigger resorts.

IMHO anything below 100km is a small resort and between 100 and 200 a medium sized resort.

With only 63km of pistes Arraba is a suprisingly small resort.

After all it is free

@johnE, I think it's an interesting question, though one to which the answer might be "none" or "almost none".

What qualifies as a big resort is subjective, so I think it's reasonable that the OP has stated minimum piste length criteria. The skiresort.info link lists c. 4,000 ski areas in Europe, of which only c. 2.5% are >75km.

That website usually defines ski areas as areas that are directly linked by lifts (e.g. Paradiski as a single area, but not Megeve). However it's grouped the Dolomiti Superski area a bit differently for some reason, which means Arabba has been classified as a separate resort to (from memory) neighbouring Alta Badia and Canazei, which leaves quite a small area as Arabba's "local" slopes.

As for Savognin - by coincidence I looked at skiing there last March, when I was thinking about cancelling our pre-booked trip to the Aosta Valley due to lack of snow. We had flights to Malpensa and I considered driving north into Switzerland where the snow was better and using Chur as an accommodation base. In the end we stuck with Aosta though.

March has 31 days which is a long time in relation to this subject. Are we talking about snow sure on 1st March or 31st March.

And snow sure seems to be one of those things that can mean many things to many people. The OP defined it has a "small percentage of lifts open and brown runs". I've never been in a resort like that and I have skied in March and April a fair amount. At some point resorts just won't open. That has happened to me once, when I was going to go to Les Sept Laux in December.

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I think a lot of this comes down to what people understand by 'snow sure'. Almost all resorts will have the majority of pistes open in March with snow that it is possible to ski on all day, which could be defined as 'snow sure'. That's not to say that the skiing on all pistes will necessarily be enjoyable all day, though I'd expect to be able to get good skiing most of the day with careful choice of slope aspect and timing (which a large number of people seem not to consider at all) - it does help that I like slush, before it transitions to very sticky

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You know it makes sense.

i suppose another way of introducing the question is that i was surprised that someone would think that snowsuredness was an issue in mid march, i dont. For sure there is a greater chance it will be warm, just like in jan there is a chance you will be wind or cold limited.

per my OP not snow sure "there is a reasonable chance that there wont be more than a small percentage of lifts open"

and on the side note, my piste length reference is openskimap.org, some interesting deviations in there from resort claimed values - and even from skiresort.info (4V, via leatta)

so far i think we have Prato Nevoso that qualifies. Honourable mentions to Savognin, Valberg, and Villard-de-Lans Correncon at sub 75k (as above). most people have mentioned places they have skied.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

i suppose another way of introducing the question is that i was surprised that someone would think that snowsuredness was an issue in mid march, i dont. For sure there is a greater chance it will be warm, just like in jan there is a chance you will be wind or cold limited.

per my OP not snow sure "there is a reasonable chance that there wont be more than a small percentage of lifts open"

and on the side note, my piste length reference is openskimap.org, some interesting deviations in there from resort claimed values - and even from skiresort.info (4V, via leatta)

so far i think we have Prato Nevoso that qualifies. Honourable mentions to Savognin, Valberg, and Villard-de-Lans Correncon at sub 75k (as above). most people have mentioned places they have skied.

A snowHead

A snowHead

My sentence sums it up and doesn't require any contentious definition of "snowsure". More response-specific answers need a more specific question. Also, March is a long time, and conditions at the end are likely very different from at the beginning. There are plenty of resorts where you'd be fortunate to find good conditions on a majority of pistes by the end of March and it would be silly to recommend that somebody went there. If required to name a few, I'd say Combloux, Praz sur Arly, Crest Voland.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

It also depends on how you define good conditions.
I prefer slush to hard pistes so I always go away in March cause I have more chance of those conditions.

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I wouldn't book Skiwelt in advance for March and I wouldn't call it "snow sure" by my understanding of this term.
Yes, it depends how you define "snow sure" but having pistes open and lifts running doesn't guarantee you will have good skiing.
I spent two weeks in Austria mid-March 2017 doing a tour of different resorts in Tirol and there was a tremendous difference between them that wasn't clear by just looking at number of open lifts/runs. Skiwelt was all slush by late morning while Solden had perfect conditions all day on everything except valley runs (Skiwelt's highest point is well below 2000m while practically all pistes in Solden except valley runs are above 2000m).

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@hobbiteater, skiresort.info just uses the resorts official values, so they will often be inflated.

Having been to Villard de Lans-Corrençon, although I think it's 125km claim is an exaggeration (like most resorts), I'm fairly certain it's over your 75km threshold.

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@under a new name, Monterosa is one of the worst "piste inflators" - its real, measured piste length was officially measured at just 88km a few years ago. Which funnily enough is close to the lower limit set by the OP wink

It's possible that the 180km claim includes the several other areas on the same pass (Champorcher, Antagnod etc.).

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Probably the lower resorts esp. if they are south facing slopes ("best conditions on the other slopes") - places such as Söll Austria that are sub 2000m. (Looks like Söll sking is between 700 & 1700m elevation).

@denfinella, I have been to Villard-de-Lans several times at the end of March, it was fine.

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I have been to the bottom of Crest Voland at the end of March and it was fine (as you probably have too, @rjs) but it would be a stretch to describe it as "snowsure in March".

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Resorts that are not snow sure in March

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