Front Range

On the east side of the ridge that is just north of Burning Bear Peak. E facing, below the ridge on leeward, wind deposited slope. See photos

It stopped snowing as I got to the trailhead and didn't snow the rest of the day. Lots of blowing snow both off trees and on surfaces all day, obscuring visibility of distant ridges. The high temperature at the trailhead were above freezing (around 35 degrees) but the temps by the summit were kept very cold by strong WNW winds. Clouds came in and out throughout the day.

I found widespread collapsing and cracking in NE and E facing terrain Near and Above treeline. Near treeline the collapsing/cracking was small, with the cracks and collapses only traveling a few meters away from my skis. The snow structure here was generally 3-6" of new snow on top of a crust, on top of facets. As the trees thinned out and I approached above treeline terrain the collapses and cracks got larger, often traveling up to 10meters away from me and larger portions of the slope dropping in the collapse. Here the new snow had formed a much thicker slab (30-40cm) and the crust had mostly faceted away making this slab sit on top of the depth hoar. The slabs weren't particularly strong and the snowpack is fairly shallow so I anticipate crusts and slabs weakening over the next few days As the aspect creeped towards north the snowpack lost a lot of its structure and alternated between the collapsing and a weak snowpack. As the aspect creeped south the crust became more supportable and overall snowpack depth was thinner