Early season at Vista Ridge

South Fork was plowed for 13km. We drove to 1550 (about 15cm of snow on the road at this point) but several other vehicles had driven all the way to the parking lot of Vista Ridge. Road was skinnable and skiable to and from the car. Early season coverage in the trees was fine for skinning, but would be hard to navigate skiing in the forest below ~1700m. Skiing above 1800m was great: 15-20 of low density powder on supportive snow. Some wind effect and thin wind crust near the ridge.

Consistent moderate wind blowing at ridgetop all day. Flurries on and off throughout the afternoon.

Dug a pit to the ground down 105cm. Profile: 4F for 15cm, then 2F for 20cm, then a layer of ice 5-10cm thick starting at 35cm down. Appeared to be some faceting within the boundaries of the layer. Then consolidated 1-2F for another 15cm before a second ice crust down 65cm. Consolidated 1F the rest of the way to the ground. Did two column tests: in both there was a moderate progressive failure ~20cm down (not corresponding to any obvious layer in the snowpack) that appeared to be potentially failing between more recently wind transported snow and the original storm snow. The snow appeared to be bonding well to both ice crusts lower down.