Quick report
Skied a NE facing line at 12.8k in the Gables Lakes drainage. We were able to get on snow at about 9500’ and from there we traveled on fully supportable, rough crusts on all aspectsall the way to about 12 k. The refreeze was solid, and there was even some new skims of ice from last night on small puddles. We first started to encounter some softening around 11 on the apron of the couloir feature which faced more East. The couloir itself had several different snow types. The narrow, uppermost section was dry, unconsolidated winter snow that actually created some small loose dry sluffing. One small portion was getting direct sun as it faced SE, and we kicked off a small loose wet sluffing here. Below the for several hundred feet, we found winter snow that had been deposited into denser wind slabs. These were mostly supportable to skis, not supportable to boots, about 1F- in hardness and not consistently distributed. They were very well glued in place and made for good skiing. The lowest reaches of the couloir and the apron were melt-freeze snow, with better corn on the apron where it receives more consistent sunshine. This melt-freeze snow was very textured , but soft enough to be enjoyable when we descended around 12:30. On the rolling canyon exit, we found the best corn skiing on the walls that faced more easterly, even at 1 pm, and most norths and wests were still somewhat firm until we got to about 9800’ and below. We were able to work snow patches down to about 9k on the exit.