Quick report
We rode to the pass, stopping before dropping towards Willow Creek. This was a great shakedown ride, but we were limited due to poor visibility from flat light and freezing fog icing over our lenses, coats, and gloves. So we opted to take a quick surface inventory of nearby slopes, near 3800'. On all slopes, a thin crust formed from the freezing fog. On the northerly aspect, this crust is over old snow. On SE and more southerly slopes, the upper few inches of the snowpack held a sandwich of a thin melt freeze crust formed by last week's warm temperatures, new snow, capped by this thin ice layer.
Weather
- Cloud Cover
- obscured
- Wind Loading
- none
- Snow Avail For Transport
- none
Skies were obscured by freezing fog, maybe mixed with light rain, winds were calm, and temperatures were mild. Fog/rain was present up to 4K.
Snowpack
Surfaces: On all aspects observed, we found a thin crust formed from the freezing fog/rain. On the northerly aspect, this crust is over old snow. On SE and more southerly slopes, the upper few inches of the snowpack held a sandwich of a thin melt freeze crust formed by last week's warm temperatures, new snow, capped by this thin ice layer.
Buried Weak Layers: We dug on a SE aspect at 3800', where we had unstable results, ECTP16 (HS~105). Weak snow near the ground wasn't continuous and was irregular. Given the old pockety and disconnected avalanches on the adjacent slope, our results make sense.