With a base of 492 cm, (over 16 feet), and some sunny skies in the forecast, Santa's been good to Mount Washington Alpine Resort.
"It's been extremely good," resort spokesperson Brent Curtain said Thursday of the holidays on the mountain. "We have one of the deepest snowpacks in the world right now — and it's definitely the deepest in Canada — and now we're looking at the forecast and it's beautiful sunshine outside as we're speaking.
"And then, throughout the week, we're supposed to be seeing consistent kind of sunnier days versus the stormier days so far that we've been seeing in December that's brought all the snow — so that bodes well for bringing in bigger crowds."
Curtain added about five metres of snow have fallen on the mountain during this past month and it's the second 'deepest December' in resort history.
The deepest December on record was in 2010 when 'Snowmageddon' struck the mountain during the holidays, and Curtain said the resort's about one metre shy of hitting that record this December. However, he noted the consistency of snowfall this year has made it easier for resort crews to manage than getting a huge dump all at once.
"What we've seen for snowfall this month is just a lot and consistently," he said. "We've seen a lot of days where there's been 30 to 40 centimetres and that's happened quite frequently throughout the last two to three weeks. So it hasn't all come at once, it's been spread out through the month which is really nice."
According to Curtain, this past week and this coming week are among the busiest at the resort and there's a range of events and programs going on for adults and kids, including a selection of events to celebrate the New Year.
Visit www.mountwashington.ca for details.