Print Story Excellent Snowboarding in Scotland
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By rdskutter (Thu Mar 03, 2005 at 08:04:52 AM EST) (all tags)
Who would have thunked it?

I'm just posting to let you all know that I had an excellent 4 days of snowboarding last weekend, in Cairngorm of all places. The snow conditions were absolutely perfect. One advantage of frequent white-out conditions is that there is always plenty of fresh snow falling.

Read on and envy me.



The Corrie Cas run was absolute heaven. That run can never get too busy because the t-bar that serves it only has a certain capacity.

The M2 was also heavenly. and for the most part it was completely empty. On Monday (the last and quietest day) I was carving down the M2 perfectly. Perfect turns, weight firmly forwards and ne'er catching an edge. Absolutely delicious.

For once, I kept away from the White Lady. It's a nasty run - and there were lots of rocks showing - I didn't want to wreck my board. That used to be one of my favourite skiing runs.

The M1 (steep but nice red run) was challenging, but very fun. I took a few spectacular tumbles, including one where I managed to do a 360 roll and land back on my toe edge with enough momentum to just keep going.

There were quite a few times when it wasn't white-out, and thankfully the sun never got out.

The whole thing was a spur of the moment holiday. My parents live near Aberdeen and phoned me and my brother up to say "There's a whole metric shitload of snow up here. Why don't we all hire a caravan in Aviemore." So we did, and the snow was so good that I even took the Monday off work too - much to the chargrin of my boss.

I've never had such good conditions in Scotland before. It's been far better than some holidays I've had on the continent.

See photos here at pbase

< FLOODING! FLOODING! FLOODING! | BBC White season: 'Rivers of Blood' >
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>My parents live near Aberdeen by Rogerborg (4.00 / 1) #1 Thu Mar 03, 2005 at 08:17:44 AM EST
Oh TISG, I'm so sorry.  Is there anything we can do?

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Metus amatores matrum compescit, non clementia.


Wow by Herring (2.00 / 0) #2 Thu Mar 03, 2005 at 03:09:26 PM EST
I'd never thought of Scotchlandia as being boarding country. I'd imagined small pistes covered in ice. Nice if you can get the soft stuff.

I'm English, and as such I crave disappointment. - Bill Bailey


Dammit dammit dammit by Gully Foyle (2.00 / 0) #3 Fri Mar 04, 2005 at 03:54:08 AM EST
Not going to get a chance to get up to cairngorm until mid-march. By which time all the snow will have melted. Really must get a car.



Could still be there by rdskutter (2.00 / 0) #4 Fri Mar 04, 2005 at 06:40:32 AM EST
There's a good firm base. As long as the sun doesn't get out to melt it all then the snow should stick around.

They've got some snowmaking cannons on the M1 and the White Lady so if the temperature is cold enough in the night then I expect that they'll be able to keep the mountain open until the end of March.

I'm wondering if I should try and get up there at Easter, but I don't much fancy standing in the lift queues for an hour at a time.

If you can get up there on a weekday instead of a weekend then the queues are much much shorter.


"BEEN A BIT CARELESS HAVEN'T WE" - Mr Death
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Yeah, it'll be a weekday by Gully Foyle (2.00 / 0) #5 Fri Mar 04, 2005 at 07:26:45 AM EST
Thanks for cheering me up :) I'll be keeping an eye on the ski-scotland conditions page... Fingers crossed.

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