White Rabbit/Paget West

<p>Given de decent refresh (20cm?) that Sherbrooke Lake area got on Friday night, we decided to go have a look at the conditions up on Ogden today. A bit of a windrow getting in the parking lot was the first sign indicating that there had been some wind overnight. -22C when we left the trailhead. The gate on the wildlife fence had been left open overnight. Evidence of some crossloading could be seen in White Knight's start zone. White Rabbit looked very good given its slightly more sheltered position. We followed an old skin track and gained the southeast shoulder of Ogden around 1900m. The more open south face had widespread 10-20cm 1F to P hard windslabs so we threaded the needle in steep dense trees until the angle mellowed out. We found a new looking cordelette around a boulder about 10m right of the proper entrance to White Rabbit. Not sure if people had rappeled into the line, worked the cornice or used that anchor for a photo shoot? We ended up moving the cordelette to a spur directly above the proper entrance and used it as a belay anchor to work the cornice and dig a small ramp leading into the line. A decent size piece of cornice was easily cut and it triggered an isolated 10cm thick soft slab that ran SZ 1.5 to the top of the fan. 10-20cm boot penetration at the top of the line soon turned into 30-40cm for the rest of the couloir proper. The fan had about 20cm of fresh snow over a SZ 2.5 debris from Monday-Tuesday's avalanche cycle. Overall, the line skied excellent. We went for a bonus lap from 2150m in one of Paget's west facing path. The sheltered guts had 40cm ski penetration while the open fan had slightly denser snow (from the wind) and 20-30 cm ski penetration. -16C when we got back to the car. Be careful with frostnip and frostbite if you head out this week. We had a partly white nose case but we caught it in time. Excellent day out there! </p>

Terrain Ridden

Alpine slopes, Steep slopes, Sunny slopes.

Terrain Avoided

Convex slopes.

Snow Conditions

Deep powder, Powder.

Weather Conditions

Cold, Sunny.