Quick report
I toured up the Southeast ridge of Saint Mary peak and skied a South facing gully to Big creek from the ~8,300 point above the South fork of McCalla creek. No collapsing at any elevation, and I broke trail the whole way, which afforded ample opportunity to get something to collapse. Very limited cracking as well. Visibility was poor and not conducive to observing avalanche activity. The only natural activity I observed was loose dry sluff piles in the gully from the past few weeks. I did not observe any new surface hoar formation from the cold temperatures this past week. Snow surfaces were fairly weak at lower elevations but gained strength above about 6,000 feet. I dug a pit in a wind loaded starting zone, SE facing at 8,100 feet to assess the most avalanche prone slope of my objective. I only dug down 30 cm below the dry January interface. The dry January interface was 80 cm down and was comprised of a rough melt freeze crust and a couple of layers of frozen facets and crusts. Pit results were ECTN 24 at about 45 cm down on a mid-storm interface. ECTX on the dry January interface. With limited additional information (i.e. not knowing the spatial distribution of buried surface hoar or where pockets of weak snow below the dry January interface might be lurking), I felt confident skiing the run, which is almost all avalanche terrain, but avoided the exposed wind loaded starting zone. Solar aspects are still harboring powder and ski conditions were excellent.