March 17, 2013, Valhalla environs (sort of)

Short trip report before putting these tired legs to bed from breaking trail in 15" of powder all day... life is hard sometimes!  Three of us took the SW approach towards Lake Valhalla.  We didn't end up making to the lake due to a) a leisurely start time, b) our character-building approach through treed slopes we later learned we could have totally bypassed, and c) running across some delightfully open SW facing slopes that we decided to lap rather than press onto the lake.  Smiles and laughter all day even as we picked our sometimes questionable skin track through the trees, and plenty of whoops on the way down.

12-15" powder, pretty light for the most part, though it did get heavier in places.  All the slopes we were on (S, SW, between 3600' and 4000') seemed totally stable.

And a ptarmigan was spotted!  (I always look for these when out on Ptarmigan Ridge... pleasantly surprised to finally encounter one, even if far from its namesake.)