A bit late, but yes winter is definitely here now. We have a good coating of snow on the upper mountain, and the cold temperatures we need to make snow on the lower slopes. Steady falls of snow are also forecast over much of the next week. Best of all most of this weather is coming from westerly weather, which is the best direction for Rainbow.

The crew at the field have been working since early June to complete field preparations in time for opening. The field is now basically ready to go once we get a little more snow coverage and at present we are still targetting an opening date in early July.

What's new at Rainbow this season? Most of the work over the summer and autumn has been to fine-tune field operations and make your experience better. Some of the improvements you may notice include:

• The West Bowl lift should be easier to use now as we have re-shaped the lift line,
• The Terrain Park lift has a better top tower for easier offload, and the Terrain Park itself has been levelled to enabled easier grooming and feature creation,
• Tower 12 on the T-Bar above the top offload has been improved to reduce the number of lift stoppages,
• All main runs have been hand-groomed to move projecting rocks,
• Our snow-making system has been improved to provide better snow-making performance
• We now have a big-screen TV in our Cafe for the non-skiers, and also to watch those RWC matches later in the season
• Rainbow is now equipped with the Recco Rescue System for improved skier & rider safety

We have also been fortunate to be able to buy our own 300KVA generator this season with financial assistance from the Canterbury Community Trust. This generator will operate all of our lifts, buildings, and snowmaking facilities and also has capacity for future growth.

Keep an eye on our snow report page and this blog for more updates soon!