Skies are cloudy, southwesterly ridge top winds continue to blow in the 20 mph range with gusting to 30, and 10,000' temps are in the mid 20's. An active weather pattern is shaping up for the West but it appears as if most of the action is going to stay to the north. We'll see mostly cloudy skies and scattered showers over the course of the next few days but with only an inch or two of accumulation. SW winds will continue to blow in the moderate to strong range. Our best chance for snow will come on Saturday night.

I was out and about with Dustin Randall of ROAM Industry on Wednesday. It was a beautiful spring-like day in the mountains with associated spring-like conditions. Last week's incredible 50" of snow has settled out considerably but trail breaking is still difficult through up to 2' of snow. The snow got very moist yesterday and S facing slopes are crusted over. Wind exposed slopes have sustained some damage, both from SW and NW winds, but soft snow can still be found in protected areas. Stability tests show that the snowpack has largely adjusted to the snow load. Remaining areas of concern include wind drifted slopes, and steep, shady, northerly aspects where buried persistent weak layers of loose, sugary, faceted snow still exist.

Wind drifts have formed on the leeward sides of terrain features, in between wind scoured zones. Avoid steep, wind drifted slopes that have a smooth, rounded appearance to them.