Photo: Temple Basin
A ski area in New Zealand’s Southern Alps says it won’t be opening for the 2025 winter because it hasn’t received enough snow to operate. Temple Basin, which is typically open this time of year, announced this week that they’re throwing in the towel on the entire season after opening the lodge for accommodations last month.
The small ski area is located in the Main Divide of the Southern Alps on New Zealand’s South Island. It’s one of the island’s oldest ski areas and has been in operation for almost 100 years now. Resort officials hoped a recent storm might kick things into gear but images on social media show there clearly isn’t enough coverage a full two months into a typical season. The new storm reportedly only brought about eight cm of snow to the resort and the upper mountain has just a 60 cm base. For perspective, Temple Basin averages about 330 inches of snowfall per year (838 cm).
“If the snow gods do grace us with a mega storm in the coming month, it is possible we will look to spin tows and run a pop-up weekend, dependent on volunteer and staff availability,” the resort said Wednesday.
In the meantime, the ski area will be open for hiking and ski touring on select weekends through September. Fingers crossed the snow gods throw a storm or two their way for one of those surprise pop-up weekends.
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