Do you live in snow country and stay during the winter or do you leave to warmer places?

Not retired, but I love the Finger Lakes. Spent four years at CU, love the Wine Trail, and now there’s the Cheese Trail. Plus I picked up a love of hockey at Lynah.

I lived in Florida for five years, and I longed for seasons again. I would never leave during the winter.

I’m a year ‘round resident of Western NY. There are some snowbirds in the area but mostly we all just stay right here with our snow blowers and shovels. We think it’s a sign of “character.”

Fall and winter are my “preferred” seasons. I love bundling up, bitching about or admiring the snow, hunkering down with soups and books and friends…

I head in the opposite direction by leaving the warmth of the US South for England to be with the SO for a few months. It’s cold and rains with alarming frequency, plus the occasional snow. The weather doesn’t stop us from going out, despite relying on public transportation or our own two feet. There is just too much to explore. His parents on the otherhand, close up their caravan (mobile home) and head to warmer climates, like Spain.

I have had a place in Florida for the past five years. Since I still work, I only go down there for mini-breaks during the winter. I love the interludes of sun and warmth, but also enjoy the frisson of excitement of the first snowfall. By the tenth, it’s grown old.

I live in the best of both worlds, at the snowline of the Sierra Nevada mountain range.
We get a few snowfalls maybe 2–6 inches, but have had up to a foot and half on occasion.
The snow is aesthetically fun but the really big snow is about 30–45 minutes above me.

Just perfect for me.

I like tropical places but am a country/mountain girl at heart. :-)

I lived in FL for 15 years and it changed my life! I miss it, I loved it. I loved the warm sun and blue skies. I loved that when people were freezing up north it was perfect springlike weather where I lived. I was thinner, more energetic, and spent a loss less money on clothes. Now, I live in the midsouth, and we get a change of seasons. If I could I would go back to Florida for three months to get out of the worst of the winter weather. What I hate the most is the grey weather. Places like Colorado are cold, but have mostly sunshine, I think I could handle that better, but it still is not preference. I do enjoy a snowfall or two, but I don’t enjoy being cold for months and months and months. I would rather live in the warm and visit the cold, than live in the four seasons and get away for a week to the tropics.

I should add, I also, ironically, prefer a more distinct season change if I am going to live in a place with seasons. Memphis is a long long drawn out fall, which some people like, but I find it odd. When it snows, it snows a few inches, is messy in minutes, and then a sheet of ice. I miss the foot high powdery snowfalls of MI, NY, and MD (places I have lived) if it is going to snow.

I still have a home in the mountains in Park City, Utah (home of the winter Olympics). I loved it there, but we can’t afford to live there without a job to support the lifesytle. We had a 13 foot drift in the front yard every year, and we loved that too. I wish one of you would buy the place. You’d look great in it!

I love winter. I love summer. I love fall. I even love… well… like spring. Each season holds its own delights. I have gone to warm places—the Caribbean, Florida, California for a week or so in winter, but I enjoy cross country skiing and ice skating and shoveling snow and driving in snow, too. I love the exercise. I love the beauty. I love feeling hardy.

I love gray days, too, because they give you an excuse to cocoon inside and read or go out to see a movie. The hottest days of summer also let you see movies, or go hang out by the pool and read. But doing nothing time is valuable to me.

So yeah, I do leave for warmer climes, but only for a week. I don’t think I could stand it much longer. I prefer to be home.

@snowberry I live in Utah, too – West Jordan. I hate winter. There is nothing romantic about driving on icy, snowy roads to get to work at the crack of dawn. Maybe if I was retired, it wouldn’t be such a drag. My parents live in Florida, but I can’t spend any significant amount of time there because of my job. Also, the sunshine state is pretty gloomy in the winter. A winter getaway in Arizona or New Mexico is beginning to appeal to me.

I live year ‘round in Minnesnowta. I love the snow and we do a ton of stuff outdoors…build snow forts, cross country ski, ice skate a ton (we have outdoor skating places at every neighborhood park it seems—more than a dozen within a 5 minute’s driving radius).
However, right about March it starts to get old..and unfortunately, March (boy’s basketball and hockey playoff season) seems to be a time we get a ton of extra snow and more than our fair share of blizzards.
I think your area (Finger Lakes) gets more snow..because my sister lives in Syracuse and every time I visit her it seems like you’ve had just a bit more snow in upstate NY than we have in rural MN.
Our problem here is the cold. There is about 2 week snap every January where it just doesn’t get above zero. (Fahrenheit) Honestly, the bitter cold I could do without. My husband says it “toughens up” the kids and in the past he’s even had them walk to school in -20 and -30 below so they’ll have stories to tell their kids. <sigh>

Still.. as much fun as we make the winter, and as much as I love that we can always count on a White Christmas here in the deep northern tundra… I’d really rather live someplace a bit warmer.
My husband is a native (has never lived anywhere except MN) and just the past couple of years he’s started grumbling about how he’s starting to like winter less. So..I have hope that when our kids are fully grown and out of the house I might get him to move where I’d really rather be living..in the Coastal Carolinas. You still get all 4 seasons..just a whole lot more WARM months and definitely more time to garden than our short growing season.

@Worriedguy’s response to this question sure sounds like something my husband would say.

@geeky_mama FYI Syracuse is in what is known as the ‘snow belt’ and they get much more snow then Ithaca and its surrounding area.

@Skaggfacemutt

I love Utah! Was at Bryce/Zion in 2006 in Feb. in the snow. Magnificent country, I’d like to buy a ranch in them their canyons! :-D

Ohhh…good to know! I was there last January and really amazed at how much snow they had in Syracuse. Maybe if I compared the Duluth/Superior to Syracuse it’d be a better comparison.

@Adirondackwannabe Whats CU?

I’m at 63 degrees North and I am stuck here; no matter how much I would love to have a few weeks somewhere warm like everyone one else.

@deni I assume he is talking about Cornell, which if my geography serves, Ithaca is right near the fingerlakes. Maybe he meant Colgate U, but I think it is more east. Not sure, but thought I would throw it out there until @Adirondackwannabe comes back to the Q.

@deni Yup, Cornell U. Colgate is 20 miles to the North in Hamilton. Great Town.

The weather here in Scotland is pretty miserable in winter. It is wet and dark and cold and with sleet rather than snow. I don’t mind it as I grew up with it and I am used to it. I don’t mind waiting for the arrival of Spring and occasionally the skies clear to reveal hills that are fresh and lovely with snow.

I wasn’t clear on that response. Colgate is 20 miles to my North, not North of CU.

@Coloma I would have sold you mine if I had known. I sold it in 2008. It was my husband’s “paradise” but after he passed, none of our family ever went up there again. Maybe too many memories. I am a tropical kind of gal, and I just don’t like cold and snow. I liked it as a kid in northern Indiana. Our woods would glisten in the sun and we would go out sledding, ice skating, and building igloos. I don’t think kids (or men) feel the cold like us little old ladies do.

@Adirondackwannabe Oh, I immediately thought of CU, Colorado University. I was gonna say, you never mentioned that you lived here!!!!!!!

@deni Never been there, but would love to see the mountians. Our’s are little hills in comparison. Although for snow, there’s not much comparison to NY. Syracuse had around 6 feet last December.

@deni : I used to live in Broomfield. Go Buffs!

@deni Shhh! No snow yet. Mid sixties yesterday. Mid forties today! For those who don’t like the snow, it hasn’t come yet but we know what’s coming ‘round the bend.

@Skaggfacemutt

Yeah, I agree, I like the cold and snow as long as I am warm. I’m a sunshine girl myself but do love a good snow, not sure I’d want to be buried for months on end though.

I live in Southern California year-round. We don’t really have wintery weather. It gets kind of cold for about a month or so and stays chilly enough to wear a sweater, but beyond that.. well, it’s been sunny and warm lately. I’m not all too fond of it. I would like some real weather.

@comity Are you in the area as well? I swear its 70 or higher out today!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

@deni What area are you in where its 70 degrees or higher?

It’s 38 degrees F here in NY

@Coloma I enjoy a good snowstorm, too, as long as I don’t have to drive in it, and if only I could make it go away when I am done with it. Now, if it was like the “great blizzard of ‘67”, where everyone in the Chicago area was snowed in for a month, that would be exciting! No businesses were open, no one went to work or school, no electricity for about 5 days. It was pretty cool! As teens, we put on showshoes and trudged down the road to a farmer to get milk and eggs. Other than that, we had plenty of canned goods and a freezer full of food, thank goodness.

No and no.

@comity Ok well I just checked the weather and it’s 57 now and was probably 5 degrees warmer when I was out earlier….but still, not far from 70! The sun was so warm you couldn’t wear more than a t-shirt. So nice. I’m in Boulder. And we’re supposed to get like 8 inches of snow tonight. Silly!

@deni : I miss living there. The weather was like a 13 year old girl…always high drama and changeable! I loved that…

I don’t really have a choice but to stay where I’m at, afterall I need to be where I work. Even then I like the four seasons anyways so no I wouldn’t do that.

@Deni I’ve been to Boulder and its gorgeous but the cost of living is much higher then in the Ithaca area of New York. For a retiree, I’m in the right place.

Sounds awesome where you’re at.

Yeah I love the snow, I live in Québec, Canada. It’s a notorious place for mighty Winters, although I have to say, not as much as Winnipeg. (where I’ve spent 12 years of my life) Although this year in Québec, it’s highly unimpressive. We’ve had one snow fall…a rather…big one, too.

The next morning it was all gone.
It just keeps raining all the time now. I like rain too though, but at this time of year, I would prefer snow. I just love dark Winter nights, walking around in the silence, with seemingly no one around. I made a poem about snow once, and Winter nights haha.
But yeah, Winter rocks, and I’ve lived in cold ass Winter places for a long time. (which also have crazy ass cannibal Summers, don’t like those as much) But if all this global warming crap is true, I wouldn’t even be surprised to see an Incan pyramid in the middle of downtown tomorrow. What happened to all my lovely Winters? :(

I love to snowshoe, so I have to be where there is snow. Snowshoes without snow are about as useful as nipples on a boar hog.

@WestRiverrat…dude. Lol.