Cirque Peak/North Couloir

Quick report

Weather

stormy, windy, warm, cloudy, sunny

Ride Type

steepSlopes, sunnySlopes, openTrees, alpineSlopes, mellowSlopes, denseTrees

Stayed Away

convexSlopes

Riding Quality

amazing

Snow Conditions

hard, deepPowder, windAffected, powder, crusty, heavy, wet

Avalanche Conditions

avalancheConditionTemp

Skied the Cirque North Couloir and took the Observation/Cirque drainage out to the highway. Stepped off at 9am from the Helen Creek trailhead and the touring snow/conditions were very stable. 6cm of fresh snow the night before made for easy travel. Once above treeline/alpine we had great weather with gorgeous views, but could see a storm rolling in from the northwest some distance away. A NW wind picked up about 2km from the summit and stayed strong the entire way to the summit. The bootpack up the ridge of Cirque peak was very wind blown with some very large cornices overhanging the east side of the ridge and some slides were observed below them. Once at the Couloir the storm approaching us began to pick up. The rappel into the couloir required two rappels but once in the skiable section the snow was very deep but very stable. The temperature was still cold (-5 without wind) during the entire decent of the couloir and the glacier. The storm was right overtop of us during the ski down the glacier which made for some very challenging navigating and skiing, but the snow was still very powdery and fun (even with all the little tumbles due to no depth perception). Once out of the glacier the storm cleared up which gave us some beautiful views of the valley. The heat then picked up and the sun was baking down on all the slopes we were skiing out to get back to the road. The ski quality was still phenomenal on the majority of these slopes, but we did experience some ice, hard pack, wind effected and wet slopes. We skied just about every type of snow on this tour. However, despite the amount of sun baking on these slopes we didn't observe any signs of weakness, but we travelled cautiously and avoided skiing over convex slopes when we could. Overall a fantastic day and can't wait to go back.

Weather

Wind Speed

windSpeedModerate

Blowing Snow

moderate

Sky Condition

scatteredClouds

New Snow24 Hours

6

Temperature Trend

rising

Precipitation Type

snow