Dust on Crust and Wet Snow on Rubicon Peak

When we started skinning we saw about 1 inch of new snow on top of a weak, wet crust on top of wet snow. It appeared that last night's refreeze was weak at best. Temperatures were warm at the lower elevations but cooled off as we ascended. The crust also became firmer and more supportable as we gained elevation. New snow amounts increased to around 2 to 3 inches above 8000 ft. On sheltered north aspects above 8000 ft. without previous tracks, we noted smooth consistent dust on crust conditions while skinning up.

As we moved into the more exposed terrain near the summit, some areas of wind affected snow existed but wind slab formation remained limited. Some small shallow inconsequential wind slabs did exist and they did break when we ski cut them. However, the deepest one was only 4 to 6 inches deep and only extended downslope about 6 ft. Snow conditions in these more exposed areas were more variable with some scoured areas and some softer areas. We move back over to the sheltered lower angle north aspects for the descent. Below 8000 ft the surface snow was wet and sticky by 1 pm, but we did not see any loose wet snow instabilities.