Gold Creek Sno-park

We had a lot of fun riding the trails out of Gold Creek today. 

Lower Elevations: The snowpack was thin, but coverage on the groomed trail was excellent. No rocks or exposed ground. Off-trail riding isn't for the faint of heart; lots of down wood and exposed ground. Creeks and holes are open.

Middle Elevations: Coverage slowly increased, and eventually, an inch or two of fresh snow covered the groomed trail. This really helped with overheating issues and let us ride for longer. A few small rollerballs were seen on cutbanks from yesterday's sunshine. There was also a thin melt-freeze crust on some slopes below last night's snow. You could get off trail and ride around, but there are still a lot of christmas trees, willows, and holes out there.

Spotted a few glide cracks that likely opened up during last week's atmospheric river event.

Driving back west saw multiple changes in the weather. Instead of partially sunny, the Pass proper was socked in with light flurries. The west side of the zone was drizzle/rain.

No instability observed

We dug on a NE aspect at 4900' on Microwave Hill:

HS = 183cm.  3-4 inches of low-density snow rested on the Early February Crust (EFC).

The EFC was roughly 8" thick (22cm) with well-consolidated snow below it. It was supportable to boots and snowmobiles everywhere we traveled. You could still pick out old crusts in the lower snowpack, but none of them popped out at us.

On sun-exposed slopes at mid-elevations, we did find a new melt-freeze crust from yesterday's warmup. This created a crust sandwich with the EFC, containing low-density snow as the meat.