Bowman Francis TH/Chimney Lake

We encountered a wide variety of snow surface conditions on our tour. Even at lower elevations (5,200') we found well-formed surface hoar around Bowman Creek. Once we got above the snowline (around 6,200') we traveled through unconsolidated, sugary, surface facets, melt-freeze crusts ranging from thin, breakable zipper-crust to several inches of supportable ice, and firm wind-affected snow.

We saw several pin-wheels in steep, rocky zones, which all appeared to be several days old. We also found evidence of old windslabs above 8000.' We saw no wind transport all day.