Not Quite a Problem Yet

A blustery day for a ski tour up Belle Mountain today, with strong westerly winds at ridgetop that were rapidly building wind slabs on lee slopes. We decided to ski the south facing burn where it was more sheltered and less wind affected than the exposed areas above the tree line. We found 25cm of snow over a layer of weak surface hoar. At this time, it wasn't quite deep enough to be much of a problem yet. The only places we could get the layer to fail were on very steep wind-loaded north/east facing rolls. Once this layer gets an additional 15-20cm on it, it's very likely going to get pretty spicy out there. Below treeline this layer is quite widespread and the crystals are well preserved. The skiing was decent and we found some fun lines down there.