Purdy day

After a few nights of good freezes, my mind drifted to bluebird days of corn skiing. So today we went into the Flathead Range to seek out steeper south-facing terrain with hopes to farm the corn and get a good sense of surface conditions. 

• Surfaces were frozen solid except for on steep south-facing terrain where slopes get more direct solar radiation. Anything that had a lower slope angle remained frozen all day.
• The crust on south faces is thick and can take a beating by the sun and warm temperatures before it breaks down. 
• Shady aspects still held cold snow. In this part of the range, we did find a freezing rain crust under 2 to 4 inches of faceted snow and surface hoar. 
• Winds at upper elevation kept southwest aspects cool except for in sheltered locations. This is where the corn was found. 

We had our eye on a steep and exposed southeast face. With a closer look from the top, we started to realize how shallow and variable the snowpack was. Numerous exposed rocks, obvious wind transport, and a surface that had no evidence of a melt-freeze cycle. After a bit of discussion, we bailed on option A. Option B was still top-notch and we got a few hundred feet of corn followed by a few thousand feet of cold snow.