Needed a break from resort skiing so headed up Days. We had cleared out (with help from USFS) the deadfall that was blocking the trail, though another tree has fallen across the trail a mile in (easy to climb over and should get buried with a few more storms). I was breaking solo and it was a LOT of work: maybe two feet of reasonably dense powder. Snow damper near the ground, light in the middle, and heavier on top (but not terribly so).

It took me twice as long to get to the summit as normal, but once there that Draw looked delicious...which it would have been, but for all the "gravel" I was chewing. In my memory the Draw has a lot of grass. In my reality it was whack-a-boulder on *every* turn for ⅔ of the descent (smoothed out nearer the bottom, but for those familiar with the Draw, that's also where the baby trees begin, making for intricate route-finding). Zero movement in the snow, which is great. No sloughing. No whoomphing. The only sound, in fact, was that of my skis smacking rocks (requiring a trip to the "skis ER" when I got back to have my bases repaired). I was on 85s so maybe some wider ski would magically have kept me from touching a rock but...if you love your skis, you might want to give the Draw a pass.

Skied CSR (with a bit of Crystal Palace) next (read: glutton for punishment), which was a bit better, but I'd put Days out of bounds for a few more storms. Lucky Trees/Lazy/etc. will have significant rocks and/or deadfall (particularly Lucky on deadfall, as usual, but worse this year (that second picture shows 30+ feet of trees that rolled down toward the trail - we chainsawed a way through with the USFS but imagine skiing through that...).

For our intrepid touring folks that think the promised 10-20" will open it up, doubtful. And given the snow structure, the avy danger will rise with this new, heavier snow falling on a bit of a mixed bag snowpack.