Quick report
Left the Alpental parking lot at 7:45 and started heading up phantom slide. The entire way up, found mostly soft surfaces in the trees with some firm crusts in wider open areas. Ski crampons were rarely needed, but nice to have when needed. Did kick off a couple of small rollerballs on the way. Surface was definitely starting to really warm and soften by mid-late morning. Dropped into the slot couloir around 12. The upper section held some soft/dry snow and wind buff/chalky snow that skied really well. Significant icy surface on skiers right near the rock wall. The lower section had a firm icy surface and we cut left as soon as possible to avoid the full runout. We took the bootpack up the thunder creek exit, where we found wind transported chalky snow that would ski well. Made it back to the south side around 1:30, and it was heavy mash potato consistency all the way down to the parking lot. Observed some snow shedding off the cliff bands on the way down and we were starting to slide small amounts of the surface snow in the open sunnier slopes.