Thread: Wasatch 08-09 Conditions

Twas nice to be out in winter again!

Dammit! I went to bed too early to read Xover’s post and instead skied from about 6:00 AM until shortly after 1:00 PM, but, fortunately it was soooo good the WHOLE time… just; FKNA, like a return to midwinter skiing after yesterdays “January” storm.

From across the way, Alta was getting hammered… almost like they were still open only with snowboarders too.

Spring skiing in the Warsnatch makes me...HAPPY!!!

One of many reunion tours with Otter and Campbell up LCC

SICK day today we skied SSE and South at dawn from Little Soup with variable .5" - 16"+ depth crystal like POWDAH!

I am logging this as the second best pow day I had all season - No joke

I heart the Wasatch



(and to those whom don't like name dropping lines - kiss my ass)

How did North above 9k hold up?

^^^ not sure; we were off of North by about 10'ish; it was warming up though. My gut tells me with the "slowly" (for this time of year) warming temps + cloud cover later today = anything not on a shady aspect will be mank.

just turn your brain on, their are plenty of shady, north facing long shots out there that will be good to very good for the next few days ... enjoy.

p.s. if you can combine said above with wind protection, you will score some crack

SPREAD EAGLE, did you or one of your crew leave a pair of gloves where you deskinned? If so I might have them. Pm with details and I can get them back to you. Looked like the lower changeover so maybe the first skier, who skied the eastern rib. Then the other two cut higher across the gully sending a decent size, kinda fast sluff down a ways, to get to the main rib off of little sup. You would have been the first three down. Let me know about the gloves.

^^^ bwa!!!

agentJ, please let me know which one of those 3 left their gloves up their ... i can't wait to publicy give one of those kooks shit for it

p.s. cool on you for trying to get their gloves back to them

AgentJ,
Hey The first track on little sup was mine. your CSI skills are right on. I found those gloves on the way up pole line and left them there when I put all my stuff in my pack. Don't know who they belong to, but they were probably left a few days ago.

Otter = a forgetful thief

Otter, thanks for the info. Wish we had kept the camera out. You were throwing up a good amount of snow and the light was good from our vantage point. Looked really nice, especially the first tracks. Was a great morning for sure. If you want the gloves, let me know.

If somebody else left their gloves up somewhere on the way up pole line pass recently, pm me and I'll try and get them back to you.

NO, Just throw up a post. maybe someone is still looking for them.

Any thoughts on south facing, 9,000-11,000 feet before the sun hits it? I'm not familiar with the Utah spring-time snowpack/instabilities.

Are you talking about skiing a south facing slope after fresh snowfall before the sun hits it? Depending on a variety of slab formation factors, the slopes will be safe or not. Generally, if the snow came in wetter and dried out, if the winds weren't nuking during much of the storm, and if concerns about deep/persistent slabs or facets at the new/old snow interface are low, fresh snow is safe skiing on a lot of slopes in the Wasatch. Soon after the sun hits fresh snow on south facing slopes in May, you're asking for trouble with wet sluffs/slabs. Not too long after that and you're certainly going to trigger a long running avalanche. It gets hot here quick.

Skiing south facing slopes without fresh snow in May in Utah before the sun hits them would be a bag of suck. give it a few days of strong sun/cold nights, and the give it an hour or so of sun.

With so much rain in the valley and the foothills taking on a Gaelic hue, the Pavlovian response insisted on turns in LCC and since there are no more forecasts for the season, a few obs might be useful.

No surprises, only lots of rain and heavy snow with some powder in the upper elevations. Just another wet spring day; it did, however, start blowing & snowing hard in the early afternoon with the sheer weight of the not quite bonded new snow making things sketchy. Not quite a powder day but not too bad either and the coverage is still good.

And no Tram. Not sure why; it almost looked as though SnowBird had shut down but I guess the Tram wasn’t running; the wind didn’t pick up until later, so, ice, mechanical, or swine flu.

To much free water on the tram cable.

Warm temperatures had clearly baked the snow underneath the new powder that fell over the weekend. To get a feel for the snowpack, we dug a few pits on south-facing slopes and did shovel tests which revealed that the new snow had bonded pretty well with the slush. Rather than sliding on the weak layer, the new snow was compacting with it.

Satisfied, we continued to the top of Powerline and dug another pit on the north side in Cardiff Fork. The results there were much less encouraging as a very hard wind slab was resting atop the same slushy layer. The snow column failed while it was being isolated so we decided to just ski the south face back to the car.

Overcast skies kept the snow from becoming manky, and the new snow was soft and creamy under our skis. Although everywhere there were signs of wet avalanche activity, the clouds made the snow much less active. Really fun actually.

Pics:

Yesterday at Alta was way better than expected. It was the first time I've actually been able to ski fast without worrying about hooking a tip or anything in a couple weeks. Definitely saw some activity under superior and just down the canyon on the N side though.

skinned patsy marley and then some other north facing aspects in grizzly on sunday.

picture is from a pit on grizzly we dug. ~33 degree north/northeast facing slope, @ a little over 9300 feet. New snow from the weekend was still fresh on top. Noticed 3 pronounced layers going from four finger to two to one/pencil, apart from a weak layer highlighted by the middle band at about 3.5 feet of depth. Thought it might be of concern, mostly sugary graupel from the storm that feel about a week and a half ago, but took some serious over the head banging to propagate any sort of fracture, well over CT30. all in all a reassuring test, and lead to a great day in the wasatch...my new home. anyhoo thought you all should know.

also, was surprised to hit ground digging, only about 6 feet of base left on that northern aspect.

anyway, if anyone is out tomorrow and interested in heading up to wolverine or just some skinning around alta, would love to pair up as i have the day off and my buddys can't go.

cheers

whapworth or anyone else: i set up a booter underneath wildcat lift a couple hundred vert from the bottom, probably going up again pretty early tomorrow. if you want to session it with me, lemme know, i suck at aerial maneuvers and am trying to learn a bunch of new shit and need people to push me (even if you suck, the fact that someone's watching seems to be a motivating factor). it was smooth today, and will be even better tomorrow if some people want to hit it and get the landing nice and smooth. i could be pulled away for a couple laps also (good skiing today, but i did set off a little slide that i noticed looking back up at my tracks from the bottom). lemme know.

sorry just seeing this, wound up not touring cause was so socked this morning, went to work and caught tailend of afternoon at the bird, heading up wolverine tomorrow with a few, supposed to freeze tonight which will help, early start 730 or earlier from top of lcc canyon road for anyone interested, then over to milly and down into Brighton, will have a ride out of bcc so anyone interested should come for sure, that's all folks. hoping for a corn sesh and maybe see some new faces.

cheers

Skied the big east facing couloir off Deseret Peak yesterday and with the refreeze & cooler weather, had a chance to ski some corn while overlooking the Tooele valley.

The road was closed at the limestone cliffs, before the Loop Campground, due to snow on the road and flash flood warnings so even with an early start, things were delayed enough that getting on & off and out from under the sketchy approach took priority over taking more pics. Otherwise, conditions were good but camping and skiing the north facing slopes and couloirs would have been better.

Originally Posted by ePiech

Skied the big east facing couloir off Deseret Peak yesterday and with the refreeze & cooler weather, had a chance to ski some corn while overlooking the Tooele valley.

The road was closed at the limestone cliffs, before the Loop Campground, due to snow on the road and flash flood warnings so even with an early start, things were delayed enough that getting on & off and out from under the sketchy approach took priority over taking more pics. Otherwise, conditions were good but camping and skiing the north facing slopes and couloirs would have been better.

nice. I skied that a few years ago. way cool couloir. How long until the road will open ya think. When we did it we hiked the road and it sucked.

How'd the South Chutes (that face north) look? Any photos?

^^^ There were still a few 2-3 foot snow banks on the road above 7K and the loop campground at 7.5K still had 2-3 feet of snow on the campsites but the road was mostly clear so it should open the rest of the way, soon; maybe, sometime early next week especially with the current forecast.

Even though the forecast does not look too encouraging, there’s still a lot of snow at the upper elevations… even the exposed north facing glades and chutes had good coverage a couple of days ago.

Have to work today, so didn't have time to wait for soft snow. Quite firm and icy this morning on south aspects. We descended at 8:30am and it was bullet proof.








The top turns were firm and smooth, the rest was 'fun' in a really stupid kind of way.


Tom checking to see if his edges are sharp.