Variable thickness snow surface refreeze in the Mount Rose zone.

We toured solar aspects on Mount Houghton and on the E Ridge of Relay Peak this morning, traveling the 8,400' to 10,400' elevation range. A strong snow surface refreeze occurred in this area last night. Depending on where we looked, the refreeze consisted of the top 4 inches to as much as the top 9 inches of the snowpack. At 11 am, snow surface melt was limited to areas below about 10,000' with still frozen surface conditions higher up on SE aspect terrain. By noon, the top 3 inches of the snowpack was in melt-phase in areas below 10,000' on E-SE-S aspects. even in areas with the thinner snow surface refreeze from last night, travel conditions remained ski supportable across all aspects at noon.