Jake's Peak Observation

We started touring at Jakes around 8:00AM just as the snow started to accumulate. The lower mountain snow surface was firm refrozen snow. Above the mid mountain plateau snow had begun to accumulate around 2 - 3 inches deep by 11:00. On steep side hills it was often difficult to keep the edge of our skis engaged between the soft new snow and firm surface below. As we gained elevation and snow depth increased we did push down small amounts of fresh snow on the firm bed surface. In the steepest areas we crossed with the most new snow we observed very small loose dry slides as a result. We did not see any evidence of cohesion but we were mostly out of the wind and little snow had accumulated by this point. On our decent we stayed on more NE terrain until about 8000 feet where we trended more SE and the snow was significantly heavier and slid in response to ski turns. By the point were were on lower angle terrain so the snow did not slide far but presumably would have if we had been on steeper terrain with a similar aspect. 

Photo 1: Just after 7:00AM Hwy 89 by Jake's was clear and it wasn't snowing. 

Photo 2: Very small loose snow slide on the firm crust. 

Photo 3: Clouds starting to build

Photo 4: Some graupel and rimed snow. The type and intensity of the new snow changed significantly throughout our tour. 

Photo 5: Visibility reduced significantly around midday as thicker clouds moved in. 

Photo 6: On lower elevation and slightly south facing terrain near noon the new snow was heavy and moving on the old crust in response to ski turns.