Public Observation

Observation Details

Observations

Toured up Basin Couloir today. Cold start at the truck at 530 am but did not measure Tair. Reasonable parking on the Horton Lakes road before the aspen grove at ~7500' and able to skin from the truck with minimal bush and rock skiing. Large penitentes and firm wind board necessitated crampons from ~8500'. Clicked out of skis once on the ascent to scramble the burnout ridge down into the couloir proper. We transitioned to booting after the mine, where the terrain steepens up and consisted of firm wind board, boot crampons were appreciated. Minimal new snow accumulations observed around ~12000'. The expected mixed bag of surface conditions were experienced in the couloir. Found a cool bare perch for lunch at the top of the snow at 12900'. The full arsenal of combat skiing techniques were employed on the initial 1000' of descent. The conditions improved immensely once we reached 12000'. We saw one solo skier in a sunnier couloir above the mine and four aspiring winter trekkers shortly thereafter around 1230pm. Did a bit more rock skiing and clicked out once again to get back over the burnt out ridge to maximize facet turns in the trees at 10500'. The final 2000' alternated between penitentes in varying stages of melt and firmer than expected wind board. One more 10' stretch of walking by the wilderness gate and then skied to within 10' of my truck, passing a stuck Ford Ranger near where we parked. They had hoped to drive up the "single track" towards Horton Lakes but thankfully got stuck in the first patch of snow. All in all, we had more good turns than bad turns in 5500' of skiing and an awesome day, high up in the Sierra.

Signs of Unstable Snow