Rainbow Mountain

The day started with an icy skin up to the lake. Around 1100 meters a trace of fresh snow began, and by hanging lake there was 5-8cm of fresh snow on a firm crust. Good skiing was observed on all slopes immediately above hanging lake. Our objective was Rainbow mountain, so we continued above the treeline into open alpine slopes. We found rock hard conditions all the way up to the top. We encountered great views, but the ski down was not very desirable. We felt the skiing did not do justice to the day, so on out way out we decided to short lap on the NW aspect above hanging lake. As we ascended we began noticing shooting cracks in certain wind deposited areas. Shooting cracks raging from 3-5 meters in length on a windslab layer approximately 3cm deep. These instabilities were only observed in isolated areas, and were easily managed with proper terrain selection. That being said, if the scale of the terrain was increased, things could get problematic.