Our trip started on Mar 1st, with a night in the Bow Hut. We traveled over the Collie icefall to Guy hut, where we spent 2 more nights. The weather: Temperature ranged -5 to -12 with moderate SW. winds. Visibility was limited, the snow surface was a relatively undisturbed 20cm+ of ski penetration. Travel through the Collie Icefall was straightforward, the upper part of the icefall had areas of wind-scoured with exposed glacier ice. Adjacent crevasses appeared plugged and well bridged as we probed through this section. We remained roped up until the top of the Collie Icefall.

My GPS guided us onto the ridge leading to Guy hut. From here the ridge was easy to follow with windswept rocks on the western edge leading us to the hut. (BTW: we informed the ACC that the hut’s thermostat requires a new battery, we had to heat the small CR2450 battery in a pot to get it to work)

Visibility was poor until late afternoon on March 3 when the skies briefly cleared, We quickly skied down to Des Poilus Glacier in the setting sun while we could see! As we returned to the hut in the twilight, moderate to strong Northerly winds were transporting the 25cm’s of low-density snow in plumes along the ridges. We observed numerous dry loose and some shallow slabs avalanches, triggered by rapid wind loading. By morning the wind had eased off, it was clear, calm and cold the next 3 days!. The snow remained surprisingly undisturbed on most slopes.

The West facing, rocky morainal slopes below Guy hut are scoured with basel facets.
Our ski tracks from the previous evenings were helpful, leading us down to the Des Poulis Gl. The temperature minimums in our elevation band on the 4th, 5th and 6th were around -20. the maximums were around -8 degrees

We opted to take the Whaleback route to Stanley Mitchel Hut because of uncertain snow stability with the recent storm snow. As the day went on the snowpack felt fairly stable along our route. We saw no significant avalanche activity. The avalanches we saw were mainly small, loose dry avalanches, that didn’t run far. The calm cold clear weather preserved the upper snowpack making excellent ski conditions on all aspects above tree line. ( there was moist snow developing on steeper south aspects near tree-line.) Small surface hoar was forming in sheltered low-angle areas,

The skiing around the Stanley Mitchel hut was exceptional! On our last day, we skied along the Ice-line route until above the Takakkaw Falls campground where we followed a set track down to the Yoho road. .
Best,
PB