Quick report
Beautiful bluebird day so we toured up the Valhalla approach and up the SW Face of Lichtenberg. Had a dusting of new snow at the parking lot that increased to 4 inches of fresh powder at our turnaround point at 5100 ft. Travel conditions were challenging, especially in steeper terrain, where the new snow would sluff of the crust while kick turning, making things rather slippery. The crust underneath the new snow was very variable all day, and we never found any consistency between aspect, elevation, or sun/shade. Some spots were fully boot supportable, while a spot a few feet away would give us knee deep boot pen. This made it hard to gauge how much the sun was affecting the snow, causing us to bail when the slopes got steeper. Started descending about 1200 and got about 300-400 feet of super nice turns in before the snow turned to mashed potatoes for the entirety of the exit.
Avalanche
- Size
- D1.5
- Type
- WL
- Aspect
- S
- Elevation
- 5000 ft
Spotted a large wet loose in the Lichtenberg South Chute on the drive out that must have occurred while we were touring.