Wet loose and wind in the Park

Toured into GNP to get front row seats to the wet loose show.

• Less than an inch of recent snow over last weekend's sun crust down low, and up to a foot of snow on the same crust up high
• We saw widespread rollerballs at all elevations and over a dozen wet loose up to D1.5 on SE to W aspects.  Increased cloud cover and strong winds seemed to put a lid on wet activity mid-day. Most slides ran this morning or late in the afternoon.  Sluffs roaring off the cliffs on Cannon were a good reminder to avoid that type of terrain.
• Strong winds were blowing snow near the summit of Mt. Vaught and Mt. Brown.  We could see big plumes in the Flathead Range but minimal blowing snow in the Swan or Whitefish.  The snow was a little top-heavy from wind affect but we could not produce any signs of slab instabilities, such as cracking or reactive stability tests.  Given the wind transport near the ridgeline, we opted to avoid a few consequential features on the leeward side of the ridge. Below the ridgeline we skied steep terrain on shaded slopes with no instabilities.  
• We spotted several older crowns on Stanton (D2) and Bearhat (D3.5?).  Hard to say when these ran.  Lots of  large wet debris from the Feb 8 rain event and smaller wet debris from last Saturday.