Chick-a-Boom

<p>Skied Chick-a-Boom today. -3 at parking lot at 7:30. Followed a solid uptrack for about 6km, then when it started climbing towards the upper moraine valley we broke trail. Ranged from 25-35cm lower density dry snow in sheltered areas to 5-10cm in wind exposed areas. Calm winds down low, moderate winds in the moraine approach to chimney col. Winds from the south. Clouds were in and out all day, but increasing all during the day, never very thick. Made for challenging visibility, distance was ok bur seeing features was brutal. The descent from chimney col was great snow, 30cm of dry storm snow, no slab formation to note, that was well bonded to the next layer. No stability concerns. We did see some high up point releases in unskiable rocky terrain, from from northwest terminus peaks of Whymper. One was maybe sized 1.5, the rest were sloughs. The traverse across through the Boom valley was not particularly fun, sidehill trailbreaking, but stability was not a concern. Last climb up the final col was shallow trail breaking and no signs of instability, dry snow. The ski back down into Chickdee on the south facing slopes was really not good. Sun had affected the snow for the top 5 cm, and the air temp was around freezing. Heavy mashed potato skiing, wet but not quite fully isothermic through the snowpack. Look, I'm not telling you how to live your life, but don't follow our route down from the last col. Mistakes were made. Our data for the day said 24km and it took us 9.5 hrs. </p>

Terrain Ridden

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

Terrain Avoided

Convex slopes.

Snow Conditions

Heavy, Powder, Wet.

Weather Conditions

Cloudy.