After spending yesterday sand boxing in faceted snow in the high alpine N facing terrain I was curious about the amount of faceting on the N facing wind protected mid elevations on the Park City Ridgeline. The faceting in No Name Bowl was minimal in comparison to what I was seeing on White Baldy. No Name Bowl is around 9400ft in elevation N-NE facing wind protected and steep. The surface of the snow was much denser and more cohesive than the extremely loose surface in the upper elevation alpine. The upper snow pack in No Name consist of about 8 to 10 inches of medium density snow sitting on top of a stout rain crust from a few weeks back then denser snow under that. I could not get any sluffing or even get wind slabs on the steepest portion of the slope to crack out and move on the dense snow underlying them, and sand boxing was not an issue. When I dug a quick hand pit I could even make a snow ball with the top 8 inches of snow which was virtually impossible on White Baldy. I would think that any new snow would stick much better to the surface in the terrain covered, that's not saying that it wouldn't be suspect with decent load but I would be more inclined to trust this type of terrain if we do get a decent load of new snow, especially if it comes in wet.

Photos: hand pit, snowball made from the upper pack, hopefully a storm coming we need one.