Avalanches are pretty much unheard of in Australia - and definitely not on this kind of scale. One very, very unlucky guy to have set this off… Pic and full story from the SMH.

I zipped down to join Al, Matt, Phil & Dan down in Jindabyne for what must’ve been the busiest weekend of the season so far. There had been a good dump of about 40cm of snow on the Friday, but a fatal car crash on the Saturday morning on the way up to Thredbo caused a 3km long traffic jam, so we turned back and joined the masses at Perisher instead. It was a good reminder why I only ever go there with kids or to telemark - it’s just rubbish for any decent down-the-line free riding like you get in Thredbo. We did have fun off the back of Guthega down to the road though, with some nice glade runs in snow that’s often too sun affected to be any good.

Thredbo on Sunday morning was surprisingly quiet, and we fit in a few decent on-piste runs before it started to crowd up around 11am, which sent us hunting for powder out of bounds in our favourite secret spot. The snow was dry, deep and totally untracked in the higher ridge and gullies, but the undergrowth keeps getting thicker each year down low since the 2003 bushfires, so it’s pretty hard work getting out these days. Well worth it though, as illustrated by Matt & Al’s pics…

The snow season started well back in April with a big dump, then went into hibernation until last week. Some reports were predicting up to a metre over the course of the week, but the first part of the front turned into a total fizzer. Al, in his eternal optimism, had caught a bus down to Termeil with the plan to zip up for first tracks on Wednesday morning, but there ended up being no point rushing. Instead, we enjoyed a leisurely cruise through a beautiful sunset down to Jindabyne, thinking Thursday would see some action from the next front. Again, a bit of a fizzer, but it did start dumping through the day and accumulated about 25cm by nightfall, right down into Thredbo Village. Al had been amongst it all day, starting with rock hopping early, turning into freshies by the afternoon, while I’d just hung out in the Alpine Hotel doing a bit of work and waiting for it to fill in.

We zipped up to Dead Horse Gap on sunset in the peak of the blizzard, and there was enough snow accumulated to ride about 2kms of downhill pitch on the main road towards Thredbo. The chaos on the road back to Jindabyne was amusing to begin with, but the novelty soon wore off after an hour of 20kmh behind a bus that refused to yield for faster cars…

It was all worth it on Friday morning though, as a total of 45cms had fallen in 24 hours, really filling things in properly. I wouldn’t call it “all-time” as we couldn’t access some of the better terrain, but it was easily one of the better days you’d expect to get during the season…

For this…

Australia now officially has the world’s most expensive lift tickets for arguably some of the world’s worst snow and conditions.

Always a great day when we get a decent dusting of snow for the first time…