North Island

With new snow in the hills, we headed to Mount Cain to see how it was bonding to our latest crust. By noon, there was 15-20 cm of new snow. Beneath this new snow lay 1-3 cm of graupel, on top of the melt-freeze crust that formed earlier this week. In the morning it was -5 and the new snow remained dry, but by 1 PM the sun started peaking out, and the surface snow quickly became moist. The winds were calm to moderate throughout the day, predominantly from the NE, but did vary quite a lot in direction. On the ridgetops, the new snow had been stripped down to the crust in many areas, and created wind slabs up to 40 cm deep in the lee. We found that in a hand shear test, the snow was sliding very easily in the graupel. In our snowpack tests we also found that the graupel layer was quick to fail, but since we did many of our snowpack tests before the sun came out, much of the new snow was lacking in slab properties. However, we began to see the snow become more of a slab on our way down. We took a lap down through the resort and found that you could feel the crust beneath the new snow if you turned too hard, but if you could stay above the crust the skiing was quite pleasant.

Success! We made it up the ridge on Victoria peak on a glorious spring island day. We could drive to 33 km on East Main Road. But we suspect it will be a lot further soon, seeing as we had to drive a km on bare ground. We left our sled at the first creek crossing and did the rest the old fashioned way. Travel was quick and sporty on the skin track before the day warmed up. We got up to 1500 m, with an air temp high of 7°. Top 5-10 cm became slushy in the sun, pinwheeling was occurring on all aspects. There was extensive loose and wet small avalanches. We found the two rain crusts that we have been tracking at Mt Cain were buried 30 & 45 cm deep. On the way down we enjoyed our first corn harvest of the year with beautiful slushy conditions!

Did an early morning tour to summit up Dream at 9am. Dug a pit at the min report, West aspect 33 degree slope. CTH 24 non-planar break on top of melt-freeze crust 55cm down. Snow seemed fairly bonded to this layer at this time. Break was not clean and snow was fairly consolidated above this point. Dream chute had decent snow about 15 cm of powder in the upper half, but then got quite chundery down below. No signs of instability from the morning. Some small loose wets in the East Bowl from yesterday.

We made our way back to Cain for the third day in the last week to check up on the persistent slab problem affecting the area ahead of the weekend. Super sunny day with evidence of yesterday's strong south winds but not much in the way of new wind slabs. At our same profile site in West Bowl we were pleased to find much less alarming test results at our crust layer down about 40 cm in this spot. Instead of dramatic propagation across our 90 cm-wide test column with moderate taps, we had an uneven collapse of the soft snow above the crust but only directly below our shovel blade, again with moderate taps. While we don't want to place too much emphasis on a single profile, we felt good about picking one of the mellower lines in the bowl to ski down. There are still more than a few features - super steep, unsupported, thin-to-thick type spots - we'd be hesitant to approach or place a large trigger like a regroup or landing an air, but it seems like we're rounding the corner. Bring on the storms!

Mount Cain received some new snow over the last few days, so of course we had to follow. We peeped just below ridge crest in W Bowl and are glad that's as far as we went! Significant winds have buried up to 80 cm's of snow on top of the ice crust from mid February. We got sudden results in our extended column test on this layer. With these results and the wonderful new snow, it was a pleasure to make our way down within the resort boundaries. If you want more info on the snowpack there right now look at @avcan_vanisland on instagram and watch our video.

Saw 30 cm on the CHRL stations at Cain and knew we had to go investigate! We arrived to positively stunning snow conditions, with 30-40 cm of new snow doing a great job of hiding the crust. Recent northerly winds were obvious (northeasterly today) with light wind effect below treeline escalating to moderate, borderline heavy wind effect in the alpine with transport still ongoing through the day. Wind slabs up to 80 or so cm deep were the result, having formed in some odd spots thanks to the northerlies. Testing these slabs at all elevations gave quite stubborn, sluggish cracking but we did observe one size 1.5 skier/rider triggered slab at the bottom end of one of the East Bowl chutes. Seemed like midslope was actually a bit more likely to produce avalanches with so much snow being stripped from the alpine and landing lower down. It was cold! -15C. Should preserve this powder nicely but keep the potential for new wind slab formation going too. Winds look like they step up a bit tonight. :(

We headed up to Mount Cain today to see how well the latest snow has helped hide our most recent crust. We were pleasantly surprised to find 15-35cm of new snow sitting on top of the ice crust that was formed last weekend. There was evidence on both Cain and Abel of a storm slab avalanche cycle that had occurred in the past 24 hours. We found that wind slabs have formed on lee aspects at and just below ridge tops, and have the potential to still slide on the ice crust beneath them. Heading up the ridge towards the golf clubs, the ice has been exposed in a few spots, making for slippery traversing. With the lingering potential for wind slabs, as well as the rapidly diminishing visibility, we elected to ski down the resort rather than head into the bowl. We found that the new snow could protect you from feeling the crust on lower angle terrain, however it was still easy to scrape down to the crust on steeper slopes. In spite of the recent wind transport, there is still a lot of snow available to be blown around and form new wind slabs with our increasing winds this weekend.

Stayed out of the Alpine due to strong winds and high avalanche forecast. Freezing level rose to at ~1500m and wet snow fell from 1500-1200m. Pinwheeling was observed as well as slide (sz1) debris from a W facing slope @1500m from yesterday’s storm.

Made our way up to check out Mt Cain today. We expected more snow with the overnight storm but only found trace to 3 cm had fallen here. Moderate to strong south winds had moved what snow was available for transport and built tiny wind slabs up to 10 cm thick. The new snow is bonding poorly, and we were able to get some mini sluffs to run far and fast on the crust. Thinking the snow from the next storm will probably do the same thing. Road is plowed all the way to the parking lot.

Did some poking around at Mt Cain for the first time touring. Found a very gnarly solar crust and a melt freeze crust every where else. The solar aspects in East bowl were basically a continuous ice sheet that did not soften much in the warmth of the day. Temps were hovering just below zero, light breeze out of the north ish. Book packed up the col ate lunch, contemplated life, love and the pursuit of good turns some day. Views were stunning.

Sun exposed snow became very wet over the course of the day but still skied great. North aspect snow stayed cold and fluffy and skied like the dead of winter. No avalanche activity witnessed. Pinwheeling observed.

Variable riding conditions was the name of the game today. Sun exposed terrain became very wet, while shaded terrain held nice powder. This was the case right up and into the alpine. Snow was very heavy by the end of the day with temps above zero. Dense clouds rolled in around 2pm. Previous melt freeze crust would break under skis. Plenty of pinwheeling in the alpine. No avalanches witnessed.

We had a picture perfect day at Cain, specifically West Bowl in outstanding conditions. All solar aspects below alpine became moist with solar heating today, but not warm enough to break down the thin crust that formed after similar conditions yesterday. One of the more aggressive lines in West Bowl was our pick to dodge the crust and it worked spectacularly. Pushing on older wind slabs at ridgetop didn't yield any cracking and our profile above Sliders once again showed no significant shears in our storm snow or at the old crust beneath it. Does it get any better?