La Niña Winter Forecast

NOAA and many other forecasters are calling for a La Niña winter. The map below isn’t a forecast for this winter as much as it’s an overview of weather conditions of the La Niña winters past.

la nina winter forecast

El Niño winters, like last year, seem to be more boom or bust for Eastern skiers. La Niña seems less likely to be extreme in either direction. From a seasonal snow total perspective an average year would be a major improvement in the Adirondacks. For the Catskills, last year is going to be hard to beat.

This map matches the winter forecast by Joe Bastardi posted in August.

Belleayre, Gore and Whiteface: Perfect Together?

If you spent time in New York this year, it was impossible to escape talk of budget crisis, extender bills, furloughs and park closures.

New York's Ski Areas - Circa 1973
New York’s Ski Areas – Circa 1973

Finding ways to streamline state government should be a top priority of our officials. One way might be to combine Belleayre with Whiteface and Gore under the ORDA umbrella.

Whiteface Olympic Ski Courses (1980)

Most New York skiers know that Whiteface was the Olympic mountain in 1980, but many haven’t actually considered which runs were used for specific events. It’s logical to assume that Cloudspin and Skyward were used for the Olympic Downhill courses, but beyond that many are vague on the details.

Whiteface Olympic Courses

We were given permission to use this post card from the 1980 Winter Olympic Games that were held in Lake Placid and at Whiteface. It came with no description. We thought it would be a simple matter to match the graphic up with a current Whiteface trail map to determine what trails had been used for each event.

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