Saskatoon’s Optimist Hill hoping for some more snow soon

The recent warm weather brought smiles to some people’s faces, but for operators of Optimist Hill, it brought concerns.

The hill has been battling spring-like weather all winter long and the most recent warm stretch could spell an early end to the season.

Maxine Tebbe, the general manager of Optimist Hill, said this warm spell cost them some powder.

“We have lost some snow, but we still had a great base out here with the snowmaking that we did with that cold snap (in the) beginning of January,” said Tebbe.

Over the weekend, Saskatoon did see some precipitation, but not the kind for which Tebbe and the Optimist Hill crew were hoping.

“A lot of the freezing rain did some damage to the snow,” said Tebbe. “We are looking again at the long forecast to see if we’re going to have some cold weather in the forecast so that we can possibly make snow for a couple days in order to extend our season.”

Tebbe said it’s been a day-by-day, hour-by-hour type of season for the hill so far this year.

If another warm spell hits, it could close the door on a ski and snowboarding season that got off to a late start.

“If we don’t have the opportunity to make more snow in advance, it would depend on the length of the warm spell,” said Tebbe. “We were forecast to get more snow this week and that has changed.”

If it wasn’t for that cold spell in January, Tebbe explained that Optimist Hill probably wouldn’t be open today.

The hill has events booked from now until the end of February.