A day of crust and corn

Quick report

Weather

sunny, warm

Ride Type

sunnySlopes, alpineSlopes, mellowSlopes

Stayed Away

steepSlopes, convexSlopes, cutBlocks, openTrees

Riding Quality

good

Snow Conditions

crusty, windAffected, hard, wet

Avalanche Conditions

avalancheConditionTemp

Went for a walk in the alpine to enjoy the inversion views (along with a few other skiers/hikers/snowshoers). Temp in town was -8 at 08:00 and 0 at the prairie parking lot at 09:00 (+5 when we got back to the car at 14:00 and still -5 in town when we got back). We gave cornices an extra wide berth while heading up the ridge and had a nice supportive crust for the whole walk up but travel wasn't too rough until we got into the cauliflower higher up. By the afternoon the crust lower down had softened and made for some surprisingly good January corn.

Weather

Avg Temp

3

Max Temp

5

Min Temp

0

Wind Speed

windSpeedLight

Blowing Snow

light

Sky Condition

fewClouds

Wind Direction

NE

Temperature Trend

rising

Precipitation Type

none

A thin bit of cloud cover in the morning mostly cleared by the afternoon, wind was light in the meadow but had some good gusts higher up on the ridge. There was a little bit of blowing snow (and may have been more if there was more snow to blow). Temps were warm but didn't really feel hot until later in the afternoon

Snowpack

Depth

70

Obs Type

summary

Site Aspect

S

Ski Penetration

2

Foot Penetration

30

Site Elevation Band

alp

Surface Conditions

crust, variable, corn