Found Winter Up High

Submitted by: rossik.21
Observations date: Wednesday, January 10, 2024 at 05:00
Location: 53.869760° N 121.666360° W
Reporting on: Snow conditions

Quick

Avalanche

Snowpack

Weather

Incident

Snow conditions

Riding quality was:

Good

Snow conditions were:

Crusty
Deep powder
Powder

We rode:

Dense trees
Mellow slopes
Open trees

We stayed away from:

Alpine slopes
Convex slopes
Steep slopes

Information

The day was:

Stormy

Avalanche conditions

30cm + of new snow, or significant drifting, or rain in the last 48 hours.

Comments

Went on an exploratory mission to Sugarbowl today to investigate the quality of the uptrack and to see if we could find winter. The lower mountain is a mess- pretty well no snow in the trees from the parking lot to around 1350 m. The only snow here was the recent storm snow and it overlies frozen ground and ice. We bootpacked this section to around 1400 m where we were able to begin skinning.

Drastic change in snowpack between 1400-1500 m. Above here, the snowpack was surprisingly deep (our pit was 150 cms, see photo), and is 20-30 cms of light powder on top of a 10 cm thick crust. Made for some really good turns at the top.

The return downhill bootpack to the car was treacherous and icy, with many obstacles to navigate and a few butt slides.

The lower mountain is very dangerous and not to be taken lightly- we knew what we were getting into, but the hazards of the lower mountain make any mission into the alpine very serious. I would not recommend travel unless you are confident managing a variety of hazards both on your skins and boot packing, in both directions.

Snowpack at 1550 m. Snow depth was 150 cms.
25 cms of powder on top of a 10 cm thick ice crust. Faceting beneath the ice crust. There is a second ice crust about 45 cms down, and one near the bottom. Lower snowpack was very solid with minimal faceting. No sign of buried surface hoar.
Performed a 30 x 30 compression test. The storm snow failed as a cohesive slab after 15 taps (moderate). The ice crust also failed in the High range (25 taps). — Snowpack at 1550 m. Snow depth was 150 cms. 25 cms of powder on top of a 10 cm thick ice crust. Faceting beneath the ice crust. There is a second ice crust about 45 cms down, and one near the bottom. Lower snowpack was very solid with minimal faceting. No sign of buried surface hoar. Performed a 30 x 30 compression test. The storm snow failed as a cohesive slab after 15 taps (moderate). The ice crust also failed in the High range (25 taps).

The only snow below 1400 m was the fresh 5 cms from this storm on top of ice.