Skiing in the foggy sandbox

Day off tour into the southern Whitefish Range sparklefluff factory.

• It's producing. Running several shifts a day. Surface hoar up to 10 mm in favored spots, like drainage bottoms. Otherwise no real pattern w respect to elevation. 
• Cloud tops about 6800 feet. Felt like being just under the surface of a pool or lake, and not being able to break through. 
• Thin, breakable crust on mid elevation slopes tipped southeast. Not present on east, nor below about 4800 ft. 
• 15-25 cm of faceted snow sitting above the 12/19 crust. Cohesionless, not coming off with planar shear in hand blocks. Sticking to crust even. Skied heavy, like skiing a sandbox.

Comfortable skiing steep terrain with convex rolls and rocky areas at mid elevations.