Hard to believe!

I choose not to show that image on April Fool's Day, because no one would have believed it. This one's from today and it shows Avoriaz, my old stumping ground in France. Usually, on April 2nd, it was the time when the snow cover was at its near maximum for the season. Like in northern hemisphere mountains the world over, March is a wet month, with lots of precipitations and of course, tons of snow falling in higher elevations. I remember that 41 years ago, there were close to 15 feet of snow in the same – not quite as developed – area of that resort.

So, what's going on? Is it just a fluke or some serious global warming affecting the Alps this year? This of course isn't the case in the Rocky Mountains. We've been having a warm spell these past couple of days, but are still measuring some 10 feet of snow at the Park City resorts' tops and yesterday, there were still 18 inches of accumulated snow left in my backyard (going fast though); however to settle the score, we're bracing for yet another major snowstorm this weekend. Going back to the Alps, this could indeed be a fluke and Mr. Winter might rear its unseasonal ugly head in May, over some already emerald-green mountains...