Overlook Bowl to Avalanche Crest

<p>Went up the Vaux Moraine skin track where we watched a group of 4 make boot top powder turns down the NW aspect of the moraine from ~2150m. Saw one size 1 slough (moderate intermittent flurries and wind loading) come down a steep NW facing chute off the W ridge below the Vaux Glacier. Our group then traversed towards the Sir Donald bivy site where we walked right over top the green open air toilet which was flush with the snow surface and followed the moraine to the Overlook ridge. Clouds and precip were in and out with moderate wind from the south. We cut a few good cornices down the entrance of the Overlook Bowl (NW facing) and further up the ridge above unskiable terrain while waiting for visibility before dropping in. The biggest cornice we cut was ~500lbs and triggered a 30 cms by 7 metres wide hard slab when it got just above a cliff band (unsupported terrain), i.e. a small result given the huge load. The remaining 3 cornices (~200-300 lbs each) provided no results. This gave us good confidence to ski into the Overlook Bowl. The ski down was boot top powder to the bottom with a thin rain crust (just feelable) down 20-25 cms for the last 100 metres. A few rolls were cut above a small rock band halfway down the bowl and didn't provide any results. To avoid the more solar aspect of the Illecillewaet Practice Slopes, we put our skins back and wrapped around the SW ridge of Eagle and headed up Avalanche Crest. The ski down Avy Crest was boot top to knee deep for most of the upper pitch. We could trigger fast sloughs on the rain crust on the steeper sections (35 deg and over). The last pitch to the highway had a very supportive edgeable crust (5 to 10 cms thick) under 10-15 cms of new snow with the last 200 metres being moist with snowballs initiated at each turn. A wonderful outing overall.</p>

Terrain Ridden

Alpine slopes, Dense trees, Steep slopes, Open trees.

Terrain Avoided

Convex slopes, Sunny slopes.

Snow Conditions

Powder.

Weather Conditions

Windy, Cloudy, Foggy, Sunny.