Quick report
- Red Flags
- Heavy Snowfall
- Red Flags Comment
- <p>Snowfall continued all the way down to the trailhead even when I left around 0830. There's definitely been plenty of it, and I was psyched to see the awesome overnight reports.</p>
Low visibility with all the snowfall happening. Got to drive to the trailhead Millenium Falcon style.
Snowpack
- Instability Comment
- <p>I didn't observe any, but I imagine there has to be some storm snow instability lurking at the mid and upper elevations. If the winds stay as light as forecasted, it might actually be downright pleasant with good skiing up high on Ben Lomond.</p> <p>There was plenty of loose snow to go around, and I certainly managed to kick plenty of it off the corners of my turns. However, nothing quite met the definition of what I'd call a sluff. With a bit more steepness, though, I would not be surprised to see some long-running loose snow given the crust and graupel. </p>
Ski pen varied from 6 to 12" onto to a firm, supportable crust that I'm attributing to all the rain down low. I was out of town for the last storm cycle (skiing somewhere near "the valley that must not be named" https://www.adventure-journal.com/2017/02/localism-ruining-backcountry-skiing/) and couldn't line up a partner for this morning (they all quite reasonably took the whole day off to ski, leaving me to get my pre-work runs in myself). Consequently, I kept it conservative and lapped the 30 degree terrain, creeping up to 35 degrees by the last lap.
Surface snow was 6" graupel on top of the crust, with 6" of that "champagne powder" I've been hearing so much about on top of that. Definitely not blower, but nice mid-density powder. The dust on crust nature made for some pretty fast riding, even on the lower angle slopes.