We found nearly every possible snow surface today from soft ice crusts to hard ice crusts, punchy wind drifted snow, wet snow, and even a little bit of dry powder. There was narrow elevation band around 8800 feet in which the snow was very sticky. First photo below shows the wind affected snow. There were obvious drifts above treeline.

Solid cloud cover kept the snow cool and limited any wet snow issues except at lower elevations where warm air temperatures kept the snow wet.

The main issue of concern were slabs of wind drifted snow. We did several Extended Column Tests, and the wind slabs were breaking about 6-8 inches deep across the whole column after about 12 taps (ECTP12); however, we couldn't get any wind slab to crack, break, or avalanche. Wind slabs didn't seem unstable, but with that test result we simply avoided them. I imagine there could be a few winds slabs out there that could be triggered.

The exit out of Hogum had great coverage and was easy (photo of creek crossing below).