A month ago the first snow-making machines were turned on Slovenia's ski slopes. But to no avail. Most of the slopes haven't seen any snow, not even a snowflake since then. Temperatures have ranged around ten degrees Celsius above the freezing point.

1.300 skiers were counted yesterday morning on the four operating ski lifts in Kranjska Gora. That's almost a third of the usual number of skiers in this time of the year. The situation at Krvavec, Rogla, Golte and Cerkno is similar. Modern snow-making technologies seem powerless in the face of nature.

Ski lift operators are not the only ones losing money because of the green winter. Hoteliers are also in a difficult situation. There have already been some room cancelations in the Gorenjska region. However, the ski resorts remain optimistic. The ski season is, nevertheless, still at the very beginning.

Instead of snow dried up grass on Pohorje
Maribor hopes to make it all up in January and February, however at the moment there is no solid ground for such optimism. The ski offer at Areh is very modest. Instead of snow there is dried up grass all around. Only two ski runs are open.

At the slopes situated at around 1.250 meters above sea-level, daily highs in recent days have been climbing up to around 15 degrees Celsius on average. Even during the night temperatures are not low enough to enable artificial snow-making. Forecasts say we can expect cooler temperatures in the first days of the new year.