Orcières-Merlette
Typically -5.1°C · 17cm fresh / week · powder day 44% · mixed 43%
What to expect in weeks 7–10
Based on 29 winters of weather data, modelled at ~2035m (not the village). Any single year can be very different.
Typically mixed, around -5.1°C, with 17cm of fresh snow over the week. Powder days hit 44% of the time. Other weeks run stormy or cold and clear.
What a season here looks like
Each track shows the typical range across 29 winters. The marker shows where your selected weeks sit.
The snow has held. The air has not.
Orcières-Merlette's typical base has sat near 95cm since 1950, and a good winter still beats a bad one by 131cm, far more than any decade here differs from another. The winter freezing level has climbed 44m a decade.
Across single winters (1953–54 to 1976–77).
1950–1959 to 2020–2025. The Hautes-Alpes region moved −13cm.
Per decade. 1229m in 1950–1959, 1557m now.
Calibrated reanalysis, 1950–2025. Bars are each winter's mean base, rules each decade's mean. 2020–2025 holds 6 winters, not ten. Every figure here averages a full season, so none of them will match the readings for your chosen weeks above.
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Transfers
| Airport | Drive | Train |
|---|---|---|
| Chambéry (CMF) | 173 min | |
| Grenoble (GNB) | 157 min | |
| Geneva (GVA) | 241 min | |
| Lyon (LYS) | 183 min |
Method & sources
We weigh snow reliability against this resort's own history, add live conditions where we have them, then adjust for how hard the trip is for your group.
- 01ERA5-Land hourly grid → daily SWE & snow depth at the resort cell.
- 02Bias-correct against ground stations (SLF / Météo-France nivôse).
- 03Build per-week climatological percentile · 30 winters.
- 04Anomaly = current week vs. cell's own 30-year baseline.
- 05Snow-sure read at the highest-snow cell within ~15km. When most resorts are bare, ranking shifts toward this, surfacing glaciers in shoulder seasons.
- 06Weight + rank against your origin & vibe profile.
Snow data sources
Ground stations the score is based on.
- ORCIERES_NIVOmeteofrance