Approach via Days Fork with one partner. Nice to get out and look at this unusual avalanche cycle and see enough obvs to know that this is the new normal for a bit. Warmer days, sun higher in the sky, thunder graupel...spring is here!

Topped out on Chicken Shit Ridge and found a few nice turns working north. Most of the wind/storm slab instabilities on the N-E-S aspects around 9600' seemed to have either ran their course or settled for now. While we traversed to the entrance of our line we set a skintrack through an elaborate crust/facet/bedsurface/debris/pow sandwich, the flavor profile changing with the slightest shift in aspect. Combos I've never tasted. This party platter made Feldman's look like a Subway.

Bumped up to 9800' and found the leeward aspect loaded with soft slabs producing long running sluffs, leaving behind a soft bed surface. First sign of any cracking off ski tips or kickturns collapsing the skinner below.

Transitioned at the top of our line and had a good conversation about using ski cuts to manage the entrance (photo 1 & 2). From all the action we saw on our approach I wasn't surpised to get some movement and I was curious to find out what the bed surface was all about. On this W facing slope there was a crust a couple inches thick in places, much more solid and supportive, possibly wind scoured/hardened being on the windward side of the storm. The wind/storm slabs were thin, 5-15cm, and long running. I took great care managing the descent, this line is a little wider than ideal for slope cuts in some areas which left some hangfire in a few pockets. Photo 3 is final panel I cut, the sluff pouring over the large cliff below the dogleg exit. My partner descended in a similar fashion while I waited above the dogleg in a protected area, radios are crucial for stress-free comms in dynamic conditions like this. We exited Cardiff right as the storm started to roll in.

I share this experience in hopes of highlighting the serious nature of the crust situation we have building, not to encourage "avalanche hunting". This spring is going to be one for the books but its best to keep your head up during this seasonal transition, the cornices alone are proof that the Wasatch is about to put on a season ending show of epic proportions. The storms are still rolling in but these crusty buddies aren't going away anytime soon, becoming more dangerous, tempting, and unpredicable under a foot of fresh. Getting caught and carried in/above these zones (trees, cliffs, creekbeds) is not an option, some of the potential bed surface layers are too hard for a potential self arrest.