Saturday and Sunday in St Anton saw two massive slope side parties to celebrate the opening of the main Nasserein lift as well as the opening of many of the runs lower down the resort. This has meant that for the first time this season the resort is now nearing capacity. The bars and restaurants are now noticeably more packed and there are more people milling around in the town during the day.

As well as bringing many more people into the resort the opening of the main lifts seems to have brought with it more snow and a considerable cold snap that is also affecting the rest of the Alps. In St Anton, over the last week, temperatures have been consistently below -10°C in the town itself and considerably colder higher up in the resort. This cold snap is set to come to a head over the weekend with temperatures expected to drop to -25°C and below.

In this kind of weather it is really important to keep warm, especially when out skiing. Not dressing warm enough can at best cut short a days skiing (as it did for me today) and at worst can often be dangerous. It is often easy to forget that however cold it is in the main resort it will get considerably colder the higher up you get. The temperature apparently drops approximately -1°C for every 100m that you go up. Given this it is quite easy to misjudge the weather and not dress warm enough for skiing in the higher regions in the ski-area.

I have found that as well as wearing a thermal base layer, it is better to wear a number of thin layers rather than one thick layer. As well as this wearing too many layers is a better idea than wearing too few as you can always strip them off and put them back on depending on the temperature in different places. Lastly, it also helps if you bring something to cover your face whilst skiing and especially on chairlifts (although most of the chairlifts in St Anton have coverings that you can pull down over them, and some are even heated).

The cold weather has also seemingly brought with it another danger up on the slopes with many of the runs now a lot icier than they were a few days ago, especially in the late afternoon. Consequently, many runs that are easy in the early morning are tricky by late afternoon and some runs that are tough in the morning are starting to verge on perilous by the end of the day.

This weather has, however, also had its benefits. It has brought with it significantly more snow to the resort, which was badly needed. It can also make for some fantastic skiing as long as you dress warmly and are prepared to meet the occasional icy patch. Hopefully, though, at the end of this weekend things will warm up slightly in time for Christmas.