Sticky icky

Map for Mountain Information Network report: Sticky icky

Snow conditions

Riding quality was:
OK
Snow conditions were:
  • Crusty
  • Heavy
  • Wet
  • Wind affected
We rode:
  • Dense trees
  • Mellow slopes
  • Open trees
  • Steep slopes

Information

The day was:
  • Cloudy
  • Foggy
  • Warm
  • Wet
  • Windy

Comments

Skinned up starting at 8:30 with light snow, was good till roughly 1700m where the new 1-2cm on top of the hard crust made it extremely difficult to skin up. We boot packed until we were able to skin again and made it to the ridge below Markhor. East bowl was filled with debris from broken cornices and other pinwheeling snow. Skied down the ridge in east bowl. The snow here was actually decent skiing. Had a breakable crust for the first half but then became very sticky near the bottom of the run (slight rain for roughly 30 minutes here). We skimmed back up to the ridge, and followed the skin track down. Depending on the area on the way down there was either a hard wind crust or extremely sticky snow.