Overcast to obscured cloud cover with light winds that increased slightly in the afternoon. Temps were quite warm skinning up but there was snow down to the road.
Observation: Girdwood
Location: Crow Creek Area
Toured up to treeline on Raggedtop and dug a few pits. Stuck to low angle forested terrain.
Weather
Snow surface
Moist new snow down low and dry new snow up high.
Snowpack
At lower elevations there are still a lot of alders up. Hand pits showed surface hoar buried about 1.5' deep at lower elevations but it was kind of stubborn to pop off the block in hand sheers. The snow on top was quite moist.
We dug two pits, one at 2500' on a NE aspect and one at 2300' on a N aspect. Both had a layer of surface hoar about 1.5' deep that propagated in all three of our extended column tests with 11-15 taps. We also had propagation on facets above the Christmas crust in the 2500' pit. Surprisingly we did not trigger any collapses or see shooting cracks.
Snowpack structure at our 2500' pit on a NE aspect.
Obscured cloud cover and poor visibility for spotting avalanches in the area.
Very thin Christmas melt freeze crust at 2500' that had propagation in an extended column test.