Convict Creek, snowpack conditions

I toured up to about 10600’ in the Convict drainage today.  I got a bit of a late start and by the time I was climbing the moraines around 11 am things had already softened up quite a bit.  I decided to head towards the hippy chutes to see if the more northerly aspect had softened up at all.  Ascending the trees I found the snow to be soft moist powder in most areas that were exposed to the sun and refrozen MF crust over soft dry powder in shaded areas. (Ski pen 15-20cm) The ridge of Mt Aggie was pretty windblown but surface snow was slightly softened by the sun.    Dropping into the skiers right Hippy Chute I found the surface to be largely supportable wind board.  I found a nice ribbon of softer snow that I was able to milk for a few turns of the choke. Once I made it to the apron things softened up quite a bit and the skiing was quite pleasant.  Descending the moraine back to tobacco flats was nice. A predictable sun-warmed surface with about 10-15 cm of saturated snow on the surface.  Descending from tobacco flats to the car this late in the day proved to be less pleasant. 20 cm or so cm of ski pen in some heavy wet snow that required thinking two moves ahead. 

Some recent small loose wet activity was observed in the east chutes of Mono Jim, on the east face of Morrison but I did not see any active shedding today.  No other signs of instability were observed.