Mild Manitoba weather cheered and jeered

The mild winter weather has been a treat for many Manitobans.

But don't count Joel Pajak among them.

The owner of Springhill Winter Sports Park, located off Highway 59 Oasis Road, just north of Winnipeg, has been forced to delay the opening of the facility because it just isn't cold enough.

Although he has an artifical snow-making machine, the temperatures are still too mild for that snow to stick around.

"We've had to shut down the snowmaking on more days than we would have liked, so it just kind of extends our snowmaking season a little bit and delays our opening," he said.

"Last year spoiled us. It was really cold at the beginning so we made all our snow before December."

By Dec. 11 last year, we had received more than 60 centimetres of snow. While some had melted, more than 20 centimetres remained on the ground.

This year, we have snow cover of just two centimetres, said CBC News meteorologist John Sauder.

Pajak is crossing his fingers the park will open this coming weekend. But a little praying might help, too.

While colder air may come to his rescue, the snowmaking machine will have to do the rest.

Other than a few nuisance flurries on Wednesday, there's not much in the way of new snow in the forecast, said Sauder.

"We will get gusty Wednesday overnight into Thursday morning as a cold front passes … [and some areas can] expect some morning snow in the southwest corner of the province on Friday," he said.

But other than that, the southern part of the province will be under a mix of sun and cloud.

Temperatures will sink from about –3 C on Wednesday in the Winnipeg and Brandon regions to the –10 C range, which is normal for this time of year.

The mild temperatures will return for the weekend, though, even pushing Brandon close to the 0C mark on Satrurday. Winnipeg won't be quite as warm, but should be around –4C to –2C.

But rest assured, Sauder said, "We are going to have a white Christmas."