Greetings everyone,
Spent Wednesday to Friday skiing in
There has been significant snowfall since last weekend – the valley bottoms trails have 30-60cms. of coverage – once you are above 1800m. the depth increases significantly averaging between 100-140cm. between 1800 and 2100m. – I didn’t get much higher than that so no real info on the alpine other than there has been significant wind events with these last storms and so windslabs are likely in exposed or lee terrain.
You can now ski from the parking lots (if only barely) but the descent trails are a bit sporty with low snowcover and numerous early season hazards.
Snowpack above 1800m. shows a multi-layered crust with @ 50 to 100 cms. of snow over it – the snow below the crust is moist (almost wet) as is the snow just above the crust – things seem well bonded to the crust with no clean shears in any of my tests – I did find a moderate Compression Test down 60cm from the surface but it was not very clean (CTM 18 RP – this means Compression test moderate on 18th hit with a resistant planar shear). There was also a second easy shear 15cm. from surface where the snow surface had been affected by the wind.
No significant avalanche activity to be observed but all days were poor visibility with limited observations.
Things are skiable but remember that there are numerous early season hazards out there so bringing your brain bucket for the ride out the trail might not be a bad idea – I would also suggest that the alpine should be treated with caution until more is known about the crust/storm snow interface in that elevation band it could be quite different from what I observed lower down.
Happy Trails,
Scott Davis
Mountain Guide