Public Observation

Observation Details

Observations

Decided to venture out of the Mammoth Lakes Basin for the first time in a few weeks to get eyes on some things and see how another zone was doing prior to this weekend's storm. We ventured up V Bowl, and found out pretty quickly that perhaps we had been a bit overly ambitious. The apron is still a maze of brush & rocks. We put in a climb up the shallow convexities just adjacent to the southern gully. I probed in many areas along our climb and generally found a snowpack in the 55-65cm range, with occasional readings as low as 40cm and as high as 90cm. There were points during our climb where we stepped down to rock, wood, etc.

We dug a quick pit near the top of the climb at approximately 9000' on an ENE slope. HS 50cm. F in the top ~20cm, 4F below that, with 15cm of K hard sugary ice crust at the base. Our descent featured mostly enjoyable turns on decomposing powder in the trees adjacent to the gully, though the sharks were lurking and gave us each some nips.

Signs of Unstable Snow