Polar Circus - Ice

-16 when we left the car at 0315. We didn’t take a temperature in the afternoon but it felt quite warm when we caught the sun on our last few rappels. At the top of the final pitch we observed blowing snow in the terrain above and a small amount of spindrift. Most snow slopes on the route are covered in debris (with 0-5cm of snow on top) excluding the slope around the pencil which doesn’t appear to have slid recently. Any non debris area resulted in swimming through facets up to waist deep. Few clouds. Ice was dry all the way until the last pitch. Mostly 1 swing sticks, however the ice was prone to shooting cracks/fractures and large “settlements”.