Johannesburg - Snow skiing enthusiasts in the northern hemisphere can take heart. While spring has arrived on their half of the globe, winter is just ahead south of the equator. And ski resorts in South Africa and Lesotho are gearing up for a new season on the slopes.
The Afri-Ski resort in Lesotho, a kingdom surrounded by South Africa, bills itself as the biggest skiing area in black Africa. Opened in 2005, it lies nearly 3,330 metres above sea level in the Maluti Mountains. So snow is guaranteed, even though it is Africa.
Some 10,000 visitors came in 2007, and 15,000 are expected this year. The single ski slope, which is about a kilometre in length and 500 metres wide, is rather small by European standards, though.
Mulled wine is served and spirits are high in the resort's apres- ski bar. Accommodation for 182 people is available in luxury hotels as well as in more inexpensive lodgings. During Lesotho's skiing season, which lasts until September, about one-fifth of the visitors are foreigners.
The manager of the resort, Leonie Fourie, said Swiss nationals had been hired to prepare the slope. And snowmaking machines help out should too little of the white stuff fall.
Africa's oldest commercial skiing area is South Africa's Tiffindell Ski Resort, which opened in 1994 in the Drakensberg mountain range. Many of the country's skiers learned correct technique much earlier than that, however, since an indoor ski club opened in Johannesburg in 1975.
But the history of skiing in southern Africa goes back even further: British immigrants in knickerbockers and on wooden slats slid down snowy slopes in the Drakensberg range as early as the 1920s.
Internet: www.ltdc.org.ls, www.southafrica.net
