nz update

NZ UPDATE: COLIN SLATER

6 August 2001

Well its been a bit of a mix up recently. First we had the big dumjp which deposited what can only be described as a whole darn shit load of snow on the hills then we've had sun, rain, wind, wind, wind, wind, snow, more wind and more snow.

It's a winter scene right enough. Mostly everywhere is OK, the snow has all sat down and formed a whopping base, the skiing itself is okay as well but we could, as always, do with another foot or two every couple of weeks.

For the last two weekends I have had the misfortune of shuffling up to Whakapapa and Turoa with about 1/100th of Auckland's popuation, around 10,000 people.

The skiing itself, when you can see it, has been quite nice if a little busy! It's certainly boom time for them though and the combined 300 buck ticket seems to have been a good buy this year.

The snow is keeping in good nick with top ups of natural and man made, with down south the same. Hutt appears to have had some great skiing, if a little firm, Coronet and Remarks the same.

So it's trucking along nicely, hopefully we'll get some more fronts through and that'll keep in shape. Of course we'll have no electricity to run the lifts of of course because they are threatening power shortages. The Hydro lakes are incredibly low this year due to the drought over the summer and low rainfall since, so they reckon that in Sept we'll have power outages. The cost of power has gone through the roof as well.

Ah well you can;t have it all !!

Col

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