Convict

I travelled up Convict to monitor warming, watch the wind, and see how things have changed here over the past couple of weeks.

Todays partly cloudy skies and moderate to strong southwest winds, with intense gusts at ridgetop, helped keep things cold at the surface. Only southerly aspects at upper elevations held 5-10cm of softening, wet snow at the surface, and easterlies off of Mono Jim did not soften enough to entice a descent. I skied a rock-solid melt-freeze surface in the Hippy Trees around noon, and found a few soft turns on southeast-facing terrain in Old Man's Bowl around 1:30 pm.

Periods of blowing snow at middle and upper elevations were loading north and east-facing aspects. I often think there's no more snow available for transport, but I guess if the winds are strong enough, even melt forms can become airborne. Snow was accumulating midslope and forming a rather good-quality wind-buff caping the melt-freeze surface.

Much like the rest of the forecast zone, all aspects I travelled on had a melt-freeze crust at the surface. Solars hold melt forms to the ground, and northerlies hold dry snow below the top 20-40cm frozen surface. Many due-south aspects are nearly devoid of snow. Generally, coverage in the Convict area is shallow, and most of the low-elevation slopes above the parking lot are nearly melted out. 

No signs of instability.