After months of work, a couple of target dates as well as tentative openings, Mount Sima has finally been able to set an official public opening date and it will be on Saturday.

Saturday's public opening will be limited to the T-bar area of the hill, but Mount Sima expects the entire hill to be open by Jan. 24. The T-bar area covers about two-thirds of the hill and will be opened after it passed an inspection this morning.

Until the entire hill is open, daily pass admission will be reduced to the half-day prices for all skiers at Mount Sima. Prices for half day passes are $12 for children (6-12), $15 for youth (13-18) and seniors (61-65) and $20 for adults (19-60).

The opening date for Mount Sima varies every year, but the ski hill's goal is to begin the snowmaking making process in November so they can be open in December, leading up to the Christmas break.

This year was no different, but the hill still had to delay the public opening due to warmer temperatures and untimely maintenance breakdowns that prevented them from making snow during the season's cold spells. The temperature must be at least -10 C for the hill to be successful with the snowmaking process.

'It's unfortunate that we are having such a late start in the season and I am hoping everything will end up on a positive note and that we have a good season of snow,' said Ernie Berken, president of the Great Northern Ski Society. 'I hope people can be patient with us, it is always a struggle to open early in December. We are a weather dependent organization.'

The main concern with rushing the opening was that someone would be injured while using the ski hill or have their equipment damaged because not enough snow has been spread around to all of the accessible areas.

Natural snow makes this process easier because it saves the hill time and effort on having to place the snow, which always occurs when using the snow machines. Natural snow also ensures better skiing conditions after it is mixed together with the artificial snow using the groomer. This process makes the final product more cohesive and prevents the man-made snow from being displaced, which can occur over the course of an active day on the hill.

Berken said the recent snowfall over the weekend has been a big help and it will allow the hill to open additional runs the following weekend. Dan's Decent will be the only run open this weekend.

'Everything is looking positive right now,' he said. 'We were going to open anyways, this weekend coming, regardless of the fresh snow or not because all we have got is the man-made snow, which has given us a good base, but not the best conditions. We would have gone with that regardless, this is just gravy.'

A tester from Kelowna, B.C. will also be inspecting the haul rope today, which is the cable that is used for the chair lifts.

Berken said Mount Sima expects the chairs to be back on the lift and ready for use by the 24th.

More information can be found at www.mountsima.com.