Good but touchy

Riding quality was:

Good

Snow conditions were:

• Powder
• Wind affected

We rode:

• Alpine slopes
• Mellow slopes
• Open trees

We stayed away from:

• Convex slopes
• Steep slopes

The day was:

• Cloudy
• Sunny

Avalanche conditions

• Slab avalanches today or yesterday.
• Whumpfing or drum-like sounds or shooting cracks.

Spent a cautious day roaming around the drainages south of golden on the dogtooth. Snow was surprisingly light for how warm the temps have been but variable conditions ranging from wind effect to deeper pockets depending on the aspect. A crust can be felt on upward travel but mostly unnoticeable on the ski down. In isolated sheltered areas some whumpfing sounds were heard, on the skin track up hand shears proved to be reactive 20cms down on the crust we could feel.

We kept it super mellow and really just wanted to get a feel for how the slopes we handling the high temps and new load.

Observed multiple natural avalanches on all aspect ranging from sz1 up to size 2.5, one notably large slide on a planar slope which could possibly have stretched to sz3 but the full path and runout was obscured. Most slides were slabs failing on what looked like that 20 -30cm down layer from thin points in the pack or convexities. A couple slides triggered by cornice failure on south aspects, those cornices were huge before failing thanks to those wind events of the past few weeks.

Blowing snow seen at ridge tops today.

Dug a quick pit @2200 NE in a sheltered part of an alpine bowl.

Hs160cm

20cms fist

5cms of 1f

Mid pack 4f

Lower pack, garbage

Easy results failing on the crust, sudden collapse.

The snow seems Inspiring but definitely very touchy.