Becker/Talking

We went to Becker/Talking ridgeline to look for some remaining cold soft snow on north aspects.  Cloud cover decreased throughout the morning with light to moderate winds.  Most windward solar aspects have been wetted with developed melt freeze crusts limiting soft snow available for wind transport.  Some areas above 8000' had small amounts of soft snow along ridges available for future wind transport.   Northerly terrain was mostly soft with some punchy wind crusts in semi-open treed terrain.  The previous gale force SW winds blew through this area creating thin wind crusts and localized small wind slabs.  As we descended lower in elevation, some wind crusts were still present but travel conditions improved somewhat.  Less steep northerly aspects have also been wetted over the last couple days with developing crusts, further deteriorating soft snow conditions.  By early afternoon, it felt very much like the first day of spring.