Schriebers

It's been a glorious, sunny weekend with minimal avalanche activity at the Baker NRA. Sledders and even plenty of human-powered folks were out slope testing the entire south side of Baker in full force today and yesterday, and no avalanches resulted. We also didn't see any significant avalanches in neighboring areas facing us, like the Twin Sisters or Park Butte. We did, however, see significant signs of old wind transport everywhere. Although there wasn't any light fluffy snow around, and there were tracks aplenty, the snow was still soft enough for reasonable riding. Feet sunk in 2-4" in most places. 

Snow began at about 2500ft and was about 3 ft deep at 3500ft. The riding along Boulder Creek was grim, but doable, with no significant features that were unmanageable to navigate. Above the Salad Bowl (4700ft), coverage got much better. There's still a shocking number of small trees and rocks sticking out at and above that elevation. 

Variable, wind-affected surfaces were everywhere, although in most areas feet sunk 2-4" down. In the afternoon sun, a few convex rollovers had a sheen on them. 

I probed around in a few spots from 5000-6500ft, finding crusts 50-120cm deep fairly consistently. I dug a pit on an east-facing slope, and found a couple thin crusts at 55 and 70cm deep. A thin layer of rounding facets, still quite soft, below the crust at 70cm, is where I found the only weaknesses. 

Steep slopes moistened as they faced the sun - first east, then south, and finally west. The only aspect I noticed small new chunks rolling down was in the afternoon on steep west facing slopes with rocks exposed. I didn't see any wet loose avalanches. Flat surfaces hardly got wet above 4500ft. Meanwhile, my feet were punching in about a foot on steep south-facing slopes midday, which was about the depth of the wetting. 

Nearly all slopes had extensive tracks on them, and no avalanches were seen.