Where is all the snow?

Don't know when it was due to open but the first delay in the area is in for Großarltal.
start of skiing

Großarltal - Start of the winter season has been postponed due to the current snow conditions until further notice

The main Gastein opening is 5th December and for some reason Sport Gastein is the 6th December. There is snow up at Sport Gastein but from a fairly poor camera it does not look like any work has taken place yet. Even the chairs don't look to be ready.

Dorfgastein is due to open on 29.11.2014 so we will probably see a delay from there on Saturday.

As far as I know Kaprun is the nearest glacier and that's over 1 hour away.

The trouble at Hoffgastein is that the cable cars don't go to the top so you need to be able to get down below 2000 metres to get to the lift to the top. The Gastein side does go to the top and there is a bit of cover up there though I doubt if it extends much below.

If the temperatures are coming down next week then we should be ok with some man made stuff but if its the week after we will be cutting it fine.

Crystal have either sold plenty of holidays in the last 2 weeks (since I last checked) or they have withdrawn some knowing the situation because there are only a handful available in Austria for the 13th December.

Im sure it will all come good but I just wondered what Crystal do in the event of total resort closure. Would not like to be the airport rep who has to announce that to a coachload.

I'd heard that temps dropping in Austria over the next week or so, so good for man made stuff if no real stuff is falling. LDA supposed to be opening on Saturday. Not much snow at all down low, as far as I can see from the webcams, but probably plenty at 2600m plus. Like Jonesmski, I have been checking Crystal out - very little on offer for 06 and 13 December - wonder if they are reducing availability - must admit I don't know how TOs allocate their resources early in the season

Looks like Crystal were either just changing prices or waiting for a more positive weather situation to appear as they have many more options on there now. If the new forecast plays out I'm sure all will be well.

If anyone wants to risk it Crystal now have many destinations back and prices around 45% off for 13th December.

Some great deals for Xmas too.

Eg SportHotel Royer in Schladming down to 629 per person from 1204.

we're just booking up for early Jan, pretty sure (crosses fingers) that it will be fine for St Anton.

The problem at the moment is that it's too warm. We have 14C at 1000m this week, and it's the last week of November. There is snow to ski, but base is quite thin. Friends went to VT for the opening weekend and while Saturday was good, they said that on Sunday it was clear that a big top-up was needed. Hopefully weather changes soon. A temperature drop and a two-day storm would change the picture completely.

Well at least you have a base, zero in Gastein region. Fingers crossed that the temperatures come down as predicted.