Quick report
Skied the South Bowl of Freel today, starting from Luther Pass. New 24 hour snow amounts at the trailhead were ~2" this morning, increasing to 6-8" by the summit. Very light snow showers persisted this morning, but cleared relatively early on, although low cloud cover lasted throughout the morning. On lower elevation south aspects, a thin, unsupportable melt-freeze crust existed under the most recent snow, but this disappeared once we climbed above about 8200'. The most recent snow was quite low density, but below this, the total storm accumulations felt upside down. By late morning, there were occasional breaks of sunshine that felt quite hot, and we did not feel any wind at all today, until we crested the ridge, when there was a steady, moderate N wind, that was transporting small amounts of snow. We skied at around 12:30, and there was a thin wind skin for the top several hundred feet off the ridge, but this was not wide reaching, and in fact, coverage was quite thin until we got lower. For the majority of the face, the sun was dense, unconsolidated soft snow, that skied quite well. There was no evidence of slab formation, but also no loose dry activity, perhaps because of relatively low slope angle or higher density snow. Below about 9000', the snow became quite dense, and was obviously sun warmed, but still skied nicely. There was some very small loose wet activity off of some rocks and trees, but this was microscopic, and our turns did not release any rollerballs. On the exit along the summer road, it felt very warm in the sunshine, and the sun was becoming slightly sticky. However, as we reached the car early in the afternoon, there was some cloud cover building again, and snow showers picked up again as we left. We did not observe any natural activity on the steeper E and NE facing slopes on the skier's right side of the cirque.