•Glencoe Sledge Park

•England Club Fields

•Mountain Weather

•Weekend Preview

•Half Term Begins

•Mountain Forecast Discussion

•Webcams and Weather Stations

Glencoe has faired better for wind so far this week, having been open to the top everyday and should be open to the top from 9am Saturday! At CairnGorm lower slopes and Coire Cas should open quickly, but it will take time to open further up.

Been out on the slopes - please send us your photos to the email address at the foot of this page.

Light sprinkling of new snow overnight at Glencoe Mountain Resort to below top of the Access Chair. Bottom of Plateau runs slowly improving, from part way up the Poma cover improves markedly on the Plateau, but some scrapped / icy patches likely to develop lower down the Plateau! Best riding though is on the upper mountain. Light SE breeze, just below 0°c at top of Access, chairlift should load on time at 9am.

In the East at posting overnight drifting means some road delays, the CairnGorm ski road and A939 Lecht Pass are presently closed, check mountain report updates. The A93 Braemar snow gates are open, but the Spittal gates are presently closed. It is not anticipated that closures should be prolonged, the last to open maybe the Strathdon side of the Lecht, Tomintoul should open first.

Friday Evening Update:

Some reduction in wind on Friday allowed limited snowsports on the lower slopes on CairnGorm, with the Coire Cas T-bar opening in the afternoon and Glenshee able to open a couple of tows on the back of Sunnyside. Blustery conditions and drifting to below the lower slopes will continue overnight before easing further during Saturday morning.

At time of posting the A93 Cairnwell Pass was open, with some snow / drifting on higher parts, while the A939 Lecht Pass was closed on the Strathdon side of the Lecht due to drifting snow. Snowblower will be working on the Strathdon side AM. Drifting snow is accumulating from the Link Road up on CairnGorm and may close for a time early morning for snow clearing, but no significant delays expected on getting road access to Coire Cas.

For Glenshee and the Lecht, check www.snowgatecameras.co.uk in the morning!

While radar data suggests only slight new snowfall, the persistent wind has continued to bring more snow to Glenshee and CairnGorm than raw radar data suggests. Glenshee has fantastic surface conditions with machine packed fresh on pisted runs, Sunnyside has complete cover across the face making the fenced runs almost irrelevant. The forecast easing of the wind for the weekend is expected to enable all 3 chairlifts at Glenshee to run on Saturday. However there is a massive amount of storm recovery work still required to push out from the back of Sunnyside and up the other side of the middle valley on to Meall Odhar, the furthest out lifts anticipated for Saturday are Tom Dearg and the Cluny Pomas. The Caenlochan Poma was practically buried in places with snow up to the sheaves on some towers and days of machine work in the drifting snow has merely kept it from being buried out of sight in places!

With the wind set to moderate markedly for or on Saturday morning, CairnGorm should be able to progressively move up the mountain, the M1 Poma, likely to be the first thing to open above the Cas Tow. There is considerable digging out of both the Funicular track, tunnel and Ptarmigan Station required to open the Funicular. Significant snow has been moved from around the middle station level to improve the Sheiling part of the Carpark Run that had been rather scoured by the strong SE winds.

There is huge amounts of snow on lee aspects / slopes at Glenshee and CairnGorm, but cover is far from uniform given persistently strong winds recently, this is particularly so for CairnGorm where SE winds have shifted lots of snow off the Plateau, but have also ripped through the ski area keeping it StormBound for 3 days midweek.

Glencoe has seen almost constant light snowfall for days now, the upper half of the Plateau area runs continue to slowly improve and fill out, but the bottom most section of the Plateau has seen the temperature yo-yo around freezing. The bottom of the Plateau runs have freshened up a little on Friday, but the patchy base is icy here! As such, Glencoe is best suited to more advanced riders at present as the best riding by far is on the upper mountain, but the visibility has been persistently poor on the upper mountain and little indication it will improve this weekend. However, all uplift bar the Wall T-bar is expected to run with lighter wind allowing the Rannoch Chair to reopen.

Base facilities at Nevis Range have reopened as of Wednesday 4th Feb. The Gondola is due to be open, but with strong SE to ESE winds forecast it is yet to open. At update no uplift other than the Gondola was scheduled for Saturday.

:: Glencoe Sledge Park

The Sledge Park at the Plateau Cafe is in excellent condition! It is advisable to arrive before 2pm at the latest for sledging to get a decent amount of time on the hill. First chair up at 9am, last chair up at 3.30pm and last chair down at 4pm. Sledgers keep in mind, the Access Chair will be busier at the end of weekend days with snowsports underway.

:: England Club Fields

There has been some new snow over the past few days at both Weardale and Yad Moss, but not yet sufficient to open and the freezing level looks like going above the tops again by Saturday.

For both Weardale and Allenheads, you need to join the club with a season pass, these are still available for both at this time.

Please check club access rules / availability if not a club member / pass holder.

Weardale: https: //skiweardale.com/ .
Allenheads: http://ski-allenheads.co.uk/ .
Yad Moss: https: //yadmoss.co.uk/ .
Raise: https: //www.ldscsnowski.co.uk/ .

:: Mountain Weather

At 6pm in the West at the Glencoe SSC hut (850m) the temperature was -2.4°c. At the Top of the Access (671m) it was -1.1°c. At Base level (366m) it was +0.9°c with a SE breeze at 3 gusting 11mph.

The SAIS summit AWS on Aonach Mor was reporting -3.9°c. The Met Office station was reporting a Southerly at 23 gusting 50mph. At the CIC Hut (680m) it was -0.5°c. At Tulloch Station (237m) the temperature was +3.4°c.

In the East the Met Office Summit AWS on CairnGorm reported -5.0°c, while the Heriot Watt AWS reported an ESE wind at a mean of 41 gusting 48mph. At Aviemore the temperature at 6pm was +2.2°c.

The Met Office Cairnwell AWS reported an Easterly at 26 gusting 40mph, no temperature data was available.

:: Weekend Preview

Glenshee, the Lecht and Glencoe look the best bet for Saturday, as CairnGorm is likely to start with the lower slopes and Cas Tow as storm recovery work continues, to progressively open further up. Given there is considerable work required to dig out the Funicular and Top Station, if you are looking for maximum terrain avoiding surface lifts on Saturday, then Glenshee looks the pick as forecast wind speed indicates all 3 chairlifts should be running, with the Cairnwell Chair giving access to the majority of that side of the road and Sunnyside Chair giving access to a swath of moderate off piste across the face of Sunnyside.

:: Half Term Begins

Some locations are now on half term. Monday to Wednesday next week will be busier than usual weekdays, but the busiest half term period will be Friday to the following Wednesday, as several councils local to the ski areas have long weekends that coincide with the peak week for English Half Term.

All areas will be busier and particularly on the equipment hire front. If you have your own equipment, bring it is the best advice that can be given! Safely fitting equipment takes time. If you need to hire and hiring off-site on route to the mountain can work for you, that means you are ready to go when you hit the mountain.

If you need to hire on the mountain, book equipment hire in advance, that allows equipment to be pre-setup, significantly speeding up the process in the morning.

Carparks at Glenshee and CairnGorm are likely to reach capacity, on CairnGorm shuttle buses will operate from Coire na Ciste from around 9am. Please remember that there are currently no facilities at the Ciste Carpark.

At Glenshee the A93 Cairnwell Pass is a Clearway either side of and through the ski area, do not park on the road!

With considerably more snow in the East, Glencoe is unlikely to have carpark issues over the next few days, but to keep things organised, larger 4wd vehicles please park in the top carpark above the Ticket Office. Only cars and small vans in the main carpark area, please DO NOT block either the top of bottom exit of the carpark lanes as sight seeing visitors and sledgers will be arriving and departing throughout the day!

Campervans wishing to stay overnight will find the most level areas around the permitter of the overflow carpark.

:: Mountain Forecast Discussion

We remain in what has been a persistent broadly South Easterly pattern, but lighter winds are forecast for the weekend, though light snowfall is anticipated to continue. Visibility is likely to be variable at lower levels, but is likely to remain limited at higher elevations with continuing murky / clagged in conditions.

Less cold than Thursday / Friday, with around -1°c at Munro Level on Saturday, perhaps 0 to in a few spots +1°c on Sunday, this along with lighter wind should dampen down lower level drifting which means once open on Saturday morning there should not be any further problems this weekend with the high level East Coast access roads. Generally moderate SE wind, which should hold for Sunday then potentially ease further for Monday, but it does look like wind speeds will ramp back up for Tuesday to some extent.

Sunday could see sleety conditions on lower slopes, but by Monday it looks like light showers will return to snow at all levels of the snowsports areas. A possibility of some brighter interludes for the Northern Cairngorms on Monday! Around -1°c at Munro Level, with a light SE wind around 10 gusting 20mph, around 30mph on higher tops and the Cairngorm Plateau.

Tuesday looks likely to see heavier snow return to the SE Highlands / Eastern Cairngorms, along with strengthening SE winds once again. Around -2°c at Munro Level, so freezing at or just below the lower slopes with possibly significant further snow for Glenshee Tuesday / Wednesday. Wind speeds are likely to affect uplift on Tuesday if current forecast holds, with Glencoe least likely to be affected with the projected SE winds.

:: Webcams and Weather Stations

Lowther Hill: Leadhills webcam is online (24/7).

GLENCOE: All mountain webcams online and the first updated images are from the Top of the Access Chair are around 7am, other cams come on by 7.30am. Sledge Park camera streams overnight. The mid mountain weather station wind direction is not working, other data valid.