Australia vs New Zealand

A snowHead

We are just back from a trip to the Southern Hemisphere. Skiing wasn't the main reason for our trip however, while we were there it seemed rude not to give it a bit of a go. We were in Victoria first of all and so headed for Mount Buller.

Our overall impression of the Mount Buller ski experience was that they would clearly rather you didn't go! It is SOOO expensive in comparision to skiing in Europe. Before you even get close to anything that looks like snow you have to pay 30 dollars just to drive into the area for the day. We had a horrific hire shop experience which again was not only very expensive but completely rubbish equipment that was about 100 years old, over used and handed out by rather humourless less that helpful shop assistants. We were in the shop for about an hour and a half - it was grulling. Had there been a choice of shop of course we would have left and gone somewhere else except this place seemed to have a monopoly. Lift pass for the day was about 92 Aus dollar so with the exchange rate we recokned it was more expensive that a full day pass in most French resorts.

So wallets much lighter we headed for the slopes. I have to say that my first impressions were that I was pleasantly suprised. There had been a lot of reports of Australia having its 'best ever' season for years and given that we were there mid August which must be pretty much the middle of their season, I was glad we hadn't gone on a bad year for snow! The coverage on the lower runs was lacking but on the main part of the mountain althought there was a lot of man made snow it was still quite nice skiing. Very much like skiing in April in France but never the less warm, sunny and plenty to keep you entertained. I think that the novelty of skiing in August in Australia never really wore off and skiing alongside gum trees is certainly something that I have never experienced before. We ventured off down one of the black runs shown on the piste map and imediately regretted it. Had we of been in Europe the run would of almost certainly been shut. There were no piste markers giving you any indication of which way to head, the snow was very patchy with unmarked rocks, bolders and a ravine that apeared out of nowhere! What snow was there was icey and bumpy and no fun on hired equipment. This probably would of been a great run in good conditions but we heeded our lesson and stuck to the cannoned runs after that! There were some great intermidiate runs. Nothing particularly ground breaking but fun none the less. There was quite a bit of poleling required between some of the lifts but that wasn't the end of the world. The thing that made me laugh though was that they divide their piste map into the North and the South of the mountain on the front and back of the paper. On closer inspection however it turned out the the middle section of the mountain is covered on both sides - which makes the ski area look massive.....on paper.....

It was fun for a day out but the expense and value for money did seem to leave a slight shadow over the day. The scenery was like none I had ever skied in before and made it a unique experience. I think we would ski in Victoria again but proably would give one of the other resorts a go by way of a change.

New Zealand had a completely different feel altogether. We stayed in Queenstown and they live and breath the mountains and seem to want as many people as possible to be up there having fun. We only had one day to ski so headed to the Remarkables. The only thing we really couldn't understand was why there wasn't a proper road??? It was dirt track the whole way up and was pretty hairy. The ski area wasn't huge but really well thought out and the snow was lovely. Again some of the more difficult runs I supose that weren't cannoned were starting to get a bit patchy with rocks coming through here and there but the majority of the piste were excellently groomed. They had a couple of parks and if you are into that sort of things they looked brilliant (not my cup of tea but hey!). Lift passes where around the same price as in Australia but we were paying NZ dollars instead of Australian dollars and that made them significantly cheaper. The scenery felt much more like you were in the Alpes and was absolutely stunning. We were gutted we didn't have longer to spend there and couldn't check out some of the other ski areas around Queenstown as well. On our last day in New Zeland we were hoping to get a cheeky day in at Mount Hutt but unfortunately bad weather and another dirt road meant that it was shut for the day! So but for a lack of tarmac we thought the skiing in New Zeland was brilliant and excellent value for money and we very much hope to go back at some point and check out some more areas.

A snowHead

Some pics of Mt Buller:-

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and the Remarks:-

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katski, thanks for that. Great insight into the two areas and fantastic photos. Haven't been anywhere near those areas myself but enjoyed reading the reports.

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Australia vs New Zealand

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