Castle Peak

It felt and looked like late spring on Castle Peak today. The sunny S-SW aspects held melt-freeze conditions that were firm in the morning, then softened into "corn" by mid-morning. These slopes have also lost significant snow cover in the last few weeks. Numerous rocks and other obstacles remain exposed, and new ones melt out each day. Despite the warm weather, we did not find areas of deep wet snow. We only saw some small roller balls on one steep sunny slope.

On the other side of the compass, cold, soft snow still lingers on N aspects. We searched around on several shady N-facing slopes for any signs of buried surface hoar, but did not find it in the spots we looked. We did find shallow, weak surface snow (facets) on top of crusts on top of more weak snow.

We also saw plenty of variable snow in the form of wet sticky areas under tree cover on E-SE-S aspects, firm uneven surfaces on exposed well-traveled NW-N-NE aspects, and rough but thin snow cover on some sunny slopes. Open creeks made navigating some areas more challenging, and we spent more time than usual looking for good places to cross the creeks without getting too wet.