Bulgaria Ski discussion board

Below is a reply from the guys to our questions on the facebook page.....

Dear All, thank you for sharing your opinions here. yes, the decision is being taken to close winter operations on the 7th of march. reasons for that are the following: 1.) unfavorable weather conditions. It is expected to rain and temperatures to remain high (pls see the forecast here http://weather.sinoptik.bg/bansko-bulgaria-100733462/10-days). Temps will be above 0 also during the night with lots of rain. this WILL destroy the last remaining snow and will create a very bad and dangerous conditions for skiing and boarding. 2.) resulting from 1, there will be really very few people willing to ski. This is VERY bad business. We realize that Bansko is a platform/ecosystem that sustains a lot of small businesses on top of it, but you would not like to have your guests trapped in a resort offering a mish mash on the slopes and mud all around. They will run frustrated away and the first ones to blame would be you - their hosts! In the end we will have to operate a very expensive infrastructure for 10 hard core fans. yes, this is not sustainable. WE run a weather dependent business. We had a great season behind, snow came earlier and is about to go earlier. You know its risky to book at the tail of the season, you should have informed your guests that they book on their own risk, as we publicly announce that the season runs till the 14th BUT we reserve the right to close it before that on weather reasons. We took the decision to close it today and immediatelly have informed the municipality and industry organizations.

Hi Gerry It waqs copied from their facebook page where they had had some comments complaining and having a go that guests are still due out next week etc etc so basically highlighted to respond to certain comments
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/funbansko/posts/10151542498261940?comment_id=26095700&offset=0&total_comments=22¬if_t=feed_comment_reply

Here is the page if you can view it Gerry.

As harsh as this is for individual holiday makers if the conditions are not good enough I can understand them closing the lifts.

Very annoying but from my visit this season most of the people I spoke to said this year and last year were very good seasons (last year better than this but still this year has been very good). For the 3-4 seasons pre 2011 they had not had a decent season.

One view I have is prices on the mountain increased by 20% this year 5 lev to 6 lev for say a beer - and it transpires this is due to the fact previously VAT had not been paid to the authorities BUT had been charged to the customers.... So they have upped the prices rather than accept the Gross Margin hit.

Please all pay via credit card at the Gondela

We know people who are still skiing even today they have fresh snow up there. Bottom of resort is not good but they could still run the top lifts. I understand them closing if snow is bad and further down i would say they are right but when there is still fresh snow nightly at the top they should be able to run top lifts for another week at least. Coincides with the last Balkan guests leaving resort again. No there are not many tourists about now but people have paid for season passes etc(at ridiculously high costs this season) and others that have pre-booked passes.

It is a shame but if the weather had continued as per the weather forecasts with all the rain and very warm temps this would have been understandable. Since announcing temps at the top over night have been well below freezing and as said fresh snow most nights.