It’s a rainy Saturday Morning but it isn’t a soaking rain – at least not this morning. According to our meteorologist friends there is a large mass of rain that is moving over the Western North Carolina Mountains and rain totals could reach or exceed the one inch mark for a lot of the area. It will be one of those yucky, foggy, rainy days. We’re already seeing some hearty souls out on the slopes via some of the live webcams so for those few that will be out there today – have fun!
Ski Beech has their closing day fun planned for Sunday, March 15th, and although there’s some rain lingering around for tomorrow it will be less of it. Maybe a quarter inch of so. They are doing some pond skimming so you’ll get wet anyway.
Appalachian Ski Mountain is offering the best snow in the state today (and actually the best conditions in the Southeast and Mid Atlantic) and Sugar and Cataloochee are right behind them in offering good conditions although there are some bare spots and thin coverage areas on both. Ski Beech is a notch down as far as conditions are concerned but they still have some decent, skiable terrain to ride. There has been a definate increase in "BARE SPOTTINGS" and with an inch of rain in the forecast for today, those will likely increase further. Base depths have been dropping faster than the stock market and that is saying something!
There was no snowmaking in the state and there has been a premature closing in the state, so check out the rest of this morning’s report. We are also sharing some additional news later today so check back for more. Also there WAS some snowmaking going on north of us, so check out www.SkiSoutheast.com for more news from around the region.
Here’s the quick tour:
Wolf Ridge Resort is now CLOSED FOR THE SEASON. They had previously planned to remain closed during this last week and have a look at the weather and potential traffic. That led them to call it quits for the season. They will not reopen for this weekend as they first hoped. They passed along some "thank yous" for a great season and we’re all hoping that they can make some moves to work out the kinks with the real estate issues over there and get more open next season.
Appalachain Ski Mountain – 30° – 60-89" Base – Did not make snow – 100% with all 10 trails and ice skating. Both terrain parks in good shape.
Cataloochee Ski Area – 49° – 29-58" Base – Did not make snow – 11 of 14 trails open. Tammy Brown wrote, "As a big thank you for all of your support this season, we have decided to charge weekday rates everyday through the rest of the season, even on the weekends! They look darn nice this morning despite some light rain.
Ski Beech – 41° – 14-44" Base – Did not make snow – 8 of 15 trails open and Beech writes, "Upper White Lightning has bare areas and may have to close on Saturday." Just for the record the other trails have some thin coverage and bare areas as well, but there’s plenty of good, skiable terrain.
Sugar Mountain – 40° – 20-70" Base – Did not make snow – 100% open with all 20 trails and some thin areas and some bare spots. Some of the best conditions in the region though.
To see the closing date information for ALL of the ski areas of the Southeast and Mid Atlantic, check the SLOPE REPORT page or click here
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