FILE - A screenshot from a Mt. Bachelor webcam Dec. 11, 2025, shows minimal snow.
Courtesy of Mt. Bachelor website
On Thursday morning, Bend woke up to a thin and short-lived layer of snow on the ground, but it had yet to receive any measurable amount.
Warmer and wetter temperatures have wreaked havoc on the Pacific Northwest over the past few weeks.
For a Central Oregon region where outdoor recreation is both a big economic driver and a popular way to spend the time, the warmer weather and lower-than-normal snowpack have affected tourism, jobs and fun.
The unseasonable temperatures caused Mt. Bachelor Ski Resort to postpone opening day until further notice. Hundreds of seasonal workers have had to look for work elsewhere in Bend while they wait for the mountain to open up.
And the demand is building for ski trips, according to the local tourism office, Visit Bend.
The office usually kicks off winter tourism efforts in late November, according to Nate Wyeth, Visit Bend’s senior vice president of strategy. That’s also Mt. Bachelor’s target for opening the slopes.
But this year, a ridge of high pressure pushed cold arctic air eastward while warm atmospheric rivers pummeled western parts of Washington and Oregon.
The high-pressure ridge is “playing, like, the defensive line, almost,” said Brandon Lawhorn, the National Weather Service’s lead meteorologist for Pendleton.
It’s sending cold air east of the Rocky Mountains that would have created snow in Central Oregon, he said.
Wyeth said his family members in Michigan are having an exceptional winter.
But Central Oregon is not, at least when it comes to snow sports.
Online, Visit Bend staff say some people have spread rumors that this will be the latest opening in Mt. Bachelor history. But that’s still a ways off. Mt. Bachelor spokesperson Presley Quon said the latest the mountain has ever opened is Jan. 2, 1976.
The ski resort employs about 1,000 people each season, she said by email, and 80-85% are seasonal workers.
Tate Dobson had hoped to be one of those workers. He moved to Bend on Nov. 20 to work in the Mt. Bachelor rental department, but he hasn’t had much work since arriving.
He’s lucky, because he has family to stay with in Bend. If he didn’t, he said, he would have found another job by now and just accepted that he wouldn’t be able to ski this season.
Dobson, 24, is in it for the free pass.
A full-season adult pass for Mt. Bachelor Ski Resort costs $1,499. Lift tickets will have dynamic pricing this year, according to Quon, but higher “window prices” listed on Mt. Bachelor’s website are $224.
“There’s no other financial way for me to go skiing there,” Dobson said. “I can’t afford a season pass.”
The earlier people buy their tickets, the lower the typical cost–benefit to people planning their trip ahead of time, snow permitting.
But with no snow on the ground, some people have canceled or rebooked their vacations, Wyeth said. But Central Oregon is a popular winter destination regardless of snow, he added.
December is typically the most affordable month to visit Bend. Average daily hotel room rates are $106, half of what a room rate would be in July, he said. And there are usually more rooms available.
Thomas Penn, general manager of the LOGE hotel in Bend, said bookings are down across the board. The lack of snow has been “pretty detrimental to our occupancy,” he said. And, he added, it’s not a sure thing that the hotel will make up the lost revenue later in the season.
Wyeth said he is sympathetic to the more catastrophic impacts of recent atmospheric rivers in the region.
“The lack of snow is not the only weather-related stuff we’re dealing with,” he said. “There are road closures, there’s flooding, there’s landslides, there’s all these things.”
But as unwelcome as that extreme weather might be, a softer, colder, whiter extreme would be welcome to many in the region.
The words “pray for snow” are half-jokingly bandied about in Central Oregon cafés and bars. As people keep an eye on the Mt. Bachelor snow stake, many hope that cooler temperatures forecast for this weekend bring white powder – and tourists – to the slopes.
