Highland ski centres enjoyed a “brilliant” day on Sunday with more snow set to come as weather forecasters warned of a cold snap.
Thousands of sports enthusiasts flocked to the slopes after an overnight flurry of snow led to centres opening the majority of their ski lifts.
A series of weather warnings are now in place with the Met Office predicting parts of the country to experience “one of the coldest” weeks of winter so far.
The wintry weather is expected to last in Scotland until Wednesday with snow forecast for most regions.
Shona Bell, Nevis Range office manager, said: “Today has been absolutely brilliant, it is a stunning day with white powdery snow and blue skies and almost no wind.
“Lovely fresh snow fell overnight and by the looks of things everybody is having a great time with lots of tired happy faces coming off the mountain.
“On Saturday we had 1,000 people out but today we had 1,500 people so it was very busy.
“According to the weather forecast, Tuesday is looking similar to today with blue skies and no wind. Monday could be a little windy which could restrict which lifts are open.”
While Sarah Mcguire, finance manager at Glenshee ski centre, said the recent snow had been a huge boost with additional lifts opened yesterday.
She added: “The forecast looks cold at the moment so it looks like we’ll be able to keep the lifts open for another couple of days.”
Meanwhile, staff at the Lecht near Tomintoul updated skiers on social media stating that they had a “great cover of snow on all runs”.
The mercury could plummet as low as -7C in some parts of the UK with up to three centimetres of snow expected to fall inland.
Met Office forecaster Craig Snell said the first week of February would be one of the coldest spells so far this year with icy conditions expected along the east coast.
However, he did not expect the weather to cause any major disruption for travellers over the coming days.
