Jan 28, 2013, Whitepine Divide, East of Stevens

We chose our day partly because we knew a safe uptrack that gained about 2900 vertical to the ridgetop without exposing us into steeper terrain, and a safe exit.  Big steep lines today was not.  Trail breaking was often to the base of the knee and we figured we were skiing an average of 18 inches of recent storm snow going back to late Saturday.

Still Jake, Dave and I were able to piece together 2 short runs from the ridgetop at 5900 feet, and a third from the ridge down to 4300 before taking a trail ski out.  We mostly stayed on slopes 30 to 34 degrees.  We sent a few sluffs that stopped in concavities at the base of short slopes.  One slab propagated on a steeper slope, that we traversed at the top, and we backed off.  It was a wind scoured slope with only 8 to 10 inches over the old crust and ran on the crust.  Sluffs ran on different storm snow or subtle wind effect interfaces of varying depths less than 12 inches deep.
One gully entrance (36+ degrees) that we ski cut sluffed with some significant strength but stopped when the angle lessened and made for a safe descent on soft debris.
This may sound bland and dry but, overall, just another fantastic day with the boys!  Followed, of course, by 59er diner milkshakes!

More pics and vids here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/23557848@N03/sets/72157632638518028/