Perisher, Australia, Report: After the Storm is Before the Storm

Report from Saturday & Sunday, July 12 & 13

After the recent storm dropped 30 to 40 centimeters (12 to 16 inches) of fresh snow across Australia’s alpine resorts, every snow-hungry city slicker seemed to be heading for the hills—if the traffic was anything to go by. Both Saturday and Sunday, Kosciuszko Road was closed from Alpine Way by around 10:30 a.m. (What can I say? The early bird gets the worm—or in this case, the snow).

Thanks to jet lag, I was up early enough to catch sunrise over the Snowy Mountains both mornings. Saturday brought crystal-clear skies; Sunday delivered dramatic, moody cloud cover—an ominous prelude to another storm pushing into the Aussie Alps.

With the season still ramping up at Perisher, the resort isn’t fully interconnected yet. The goat-track links from the top of Front Valley quad chair back to Blue Cow haven’t been groomed, so the only viable route between Perisher and Blue Cow is via Copperhead Road—an option I’d prefer to avoid on a weekend. So I kicked off Saturday on the Blue Cow side and stayed there all day.

After seeing incredible clips of midweek powder turns, the early crowd gathered at the Blue Cow Terminal, buzzing with anticipation for the 8:30 a.m. open. But we were in for a letdown. Warm overnight temps followed by an early-morning freeze had left everything rock solid. I regretted not having sharpened my edges, but being among the first down Excellerator—Perisher’s iconic leg-burner—still brought a rush. After a few Ridge Chair laps, we aimed for Guthega, though the usual connecting slope from Ridge to Guthega wasn’t open, so we took Side Saddle to Terminal Chair and then onward.

We were hoping Guthega’s natural-snow-only runs would offer softer turns, but the sun had hit those slopes hard too. The snow was just as firm. After a few laps on Blue Calf and the Blue Cow T-bar, we ducked back to Blue Cow. Freedom Chair wasn’t spinning yet, but we watched the Mountain Ops crew digging it out, hoping for an afternoon launch.

Terminal Chair was predictably mobbed, so we opted for the quieter Summit Chair. Zali’s was packed, and Side Saddle had delivered our best turns earlier that morning, so we lapped it again and again from Summit Chair until the crowds thinned out below and we made our way back to the Skitube terminal.

Having been up since just before midnight, I hit a wall and called it early—opting instead for après at The Man from Snowy River Hotel. The bar menu is strong again this year. The Green Goddess Salad was excellent, and the waffle fries (bless whoever insisted on the share size) hit the spot.

Sunday, I aimed for the other side of the resort—partly to try the new Mount Perisher 6-chair, but mostly because I’d heard the snow was better over there. The chairlifts were packed again, but the T-bars were empty, so I started with some mellow Front Valley laps to warm up. I slowly crossed the valley, lapping Sturt, Wentworth, Blaxland, and Lawson with barely a handful of skiers in sight. From the top of Lawson, I made my way across to Mount Perisher.

The new 6-pack chair is a game-changer and has changed the feel of the run formerly known as Towers (now Legends). Padded seats—a novelty in Perisher—and loading via a conveyor belt (I know, I don’t like them either but apparently they are more efficient… although judging by some people’s inability to stand on a conveyor without falling over you might be surprised by this), are just two luxury features of the high-speed chair, which unfortunately was not running on high-speed at the time due to the winds.

From the top, you unload toward Eyre, and the view opens up in a whole new way. But I barely had time to soak it in—the wind was coming in fast, and I suspected the lift wouldn’t stay open long. I made a beeline for the Eyre T-bar, which would likely stay operational even as the chairs started to shut down.

Sure enough, half an hour later, the chairs were grinding to a halt. From the Eyre T-bar, I could see lifties reeling in the chairs on the new 6-pack—a great feature that protects the equipment during wind events. Eyre itself had been freshly groomed from the top of Shiftys down into the bowl, and the snow there was the best I skied all weekend. The storm made the upper part of the T-bar ride feel like an aggressive microdermabrasion to the face, but it also refilled our tracks with windblown pow lap after lap.

We kept skiing Eyre until our legs gave out. Weaving our way back from Eyre with many chairlifts on windhold through the increasing wind was a bit of an adventure. It was certainly the first time I heard a lift operator plead for skiers to take a snowboarder on the t-bar so they would not get blown into the towers.

The storm swept across the Snowy Mountains fierce and wild on Sunday afternoon. As the afternoon turned into evening, we could see the first flakes fall from our window and by the next morning, the wind and snowfall (of about 12 centimeters/5 inches) had turned Perisher Valley into a pristine winter wonderland as the wind blew the fresh snow into any snowcat or skidoo tracks in the village. Unfortunately, it also meant that all my snow shoveling to my lodge had gone to the dogs but that’s a luxury problem to have.

The 2025 season in shaping up to be a good one—and we all deserve that after the last two seasons!

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