Windslab Frog lake

We toured from Frog Lake Huts back to the Castle Peak TH today.   I planned a very conservative route to avoid avalanche terrain and we gave any slopes with overhead hazard a wide birth.   Our group was assailed by blowing snow and strong to extreme winds through out our exit from Frog- the wind direction was highly variable and we observed wind loading on all aspects. Once near and west of the crest the winds were strong gusting to  extreme out of the south west.  Intense snow transport was the theme of the day but we didn't observe any shooting cracks even in wind loaded pockets.  We experienced significantly less ski penetration then we had anticipated for given the forecast and breaking trail was easy.   Between pole probing, the ski quality and trail breaking the new snow felt very "right side up" through out our tour with no evidence of storm slabs.    

As we neared the crest Just NW of Frog Lake overlook we noticed the toe of a large avalanche- It appeared to be a very fresh naturally triggered wind slab that was likely triggered from the cornice above.  The crown was wider than 250 feet and the slide had traveled down to the sparse treeline 200 feet below. It was hard to observe the full size of the slide as we were being blasted by jets of snow from the ridge above.   This path is a common sled access point into the north reaches of Castle and the debris  completely covered the usual up track that the sleds frequent.  The crown had already partially been refilled by find loading and the debris had a trace amount of new snow. The  crown was approximately  be 4-5' deep and the avalanche seemed to have failed in the new storm snow, however the slide had stepped down to a deeper layer that may have been in the old snow- I didn't investigate further as my guests and I were being blasted by the gale force winds ripping over the crest.  We snapped a couple quick photos and preceded to find some surprisingly good skiing even on the windward aspects as we descended down towards Castle creek. 

Also- Castle creek was very much open.  It took us a fair amount of time to find a snow bridge to cross it and avoid an unplanned swim.