Southern San Juan
SnowpackChris Dickson · Jan 29, 2025 · Southern San Juan
Weather
The snowfall began at 10:45am. Periods of intense snowfall (S2) and gusty southerly winds moved through around midday. By the end of my tour, 3 inches had accumulated up high, and 1 inch fell in the parking lot.
Snowpack
I dug two pits. One hasty pit below treeline at 10,000' on a northeast-facing slope revealed a completely faceted snowpack, 70cms deep. Surprisingly, despite the midpack being fist-hard when you push on it, it still retains some support to ski pressure. Conditions were less "trapdoory" then expected here. That said, skinning on the faceted surface snow still felt like walking on ball bearings... Up higher, I found patchy wind slabs along a ridgeline that cracked but were stubborn to ski pressure. I dug in a drifted area and found 135cm, again mostly faceted, but with a few hard wind-pressed layers in the midpack. I got hard non-propagating results where a 1-finger hard slab sat over top of fist-minus facets about 80cm down. Skiing on shady slopes was surprisingly good, with turns gouging about 20cm deep into the faceted snow surface on an open northeast slope. The skiing quickly got worse as the aspect changed (crust), and then the snowpack disappeared right out from underneath me as the slope tilted to the southeast.