Was skiing in the Flute ridge area today. Had to ski down Symphony chair to access the backcountry because of WB’s AC program as in full swing. Whistler looked a bit like a war zone with slides in some unusual start zones, as well as the normal places. Many of the recent slides have gone down to the facets and Dec 6 crust.
Skiing up Lesser Flute was work sometimes, occasionally the ski pen was near waist deep, in the trees. Foot Pen at 1700m was 1m. No whumps, but others are reporting lot of settlements. Creeks at this elevation are filled in reasonably. There is about 1.2m of snow now at 1700m and in the alpine there is quite a bit of windslabbing. I went to tree line and skied down in good quality snow. But took it really easy and stayed off bigger avalanche terrain angled slopes. Things feel ripe to slide and there is lots of evidence of past activity. I did not see any naturals today – they must be waiting for a trigger.... There is a report that Cowboy ridge had a very substantial slab avalanche that broke across the slope for many hundreds of meters and was up to 1m deep.
In conclusion skiing is quite good, you really have to work for your turns, but if you venture into avalanche terrain you might just be playing a very serious game of roulette.
Time for a drink, Happy new year,
Dave Sarkany
Ski Guide