Cairngorm Mountain above Aviemore in Scotland expects to open this May bank holiday weekend to clock up five months of continual operations since the area opened for the winter on December 1st last year.

Less than ten days after achieving its winter season target of 51,000 skiers, CairnGorm Mountain broke its revised target of 60,000 skiers and management a week ago when, on Tuesday morning (April 22nd), Jo Bennett of Milnathort, Perth and Kinross, a regular skier at Scotland’s resorts, became this year’s 60,000th snowsports visitor to CairnGorm this winter. Jo, a pharmacist has been snowboarding for 10 years and started her skiing career in Cervinia, Italy. It’s four years since she skied at CairnGorm Mountain, but with conditions so good at CairnGorm she couldn’t resist a final day out on her board. With quality conditions still evident from the mid-mountain to the summit, CairnGorm is now hoping to attract a further 2-3000 winter sports enthusiasts before, eventually, it closes for what it describes as having been, “An unexpectedly good season for Scottish skiing.”

Snow has fallen regularly on the mountain for the past week, the corries and the gullies have been filled with fresh powder snow and the pistes across the mountain have been groomed to provide skiing and snowboarding conditions of a quality that has not been enjoyed at CairnGorm Mountain for several years. And certainly of a quality that has not been available in April for a long, long time.

Said Tania Alliod, CML’s Marketing Manager:

“The combinations of quality snow conditions, blue sky and sunshine last weekend made CairnGorm look its best and more than 3,000 skiers took advantage of what were Alpine-like conditions but with a distinctive Scottish flavour. On top of our regular season ticket holders, we welcomed 1,300 day skiers on Saturday with a similar number on Sunday, making it not only the busiest weekend for this season but also the busiest April weekend since the funicular opened. It is certainly encouraging but we mustn’t forget that last year, because of the poorest snow conditions that we have ever experienced, we had our worse year ever. ”

“Most of our visitors come from Scotland and the north of England and they are making use of the quality conditions on their doorstep. “We remain confident that we could be offering skiing into May and have already made tentative plans for a Snow Festival at CairnGorm during the Bank Holiday weekend over 2nd to 5th May. That certainly has to be good news for the entire area”

Of the other four Scottish areas, Glenshee, the Lecht and Glencoe have closed for the season. Nevis Range has snow cover but decided not top open this week or skiing due to lack of business last week, it is considering opening for the coming Bank Holiday weekend subject to conditions. Cairngorm remains open daily with a 440m vertical and had fresh snow yesterday (Tuesday 29th April).

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