Northern Gallatin

I went with a party of 4 to check out the ice climb Tequila Tour - what we believe to be "Willis Route" in the guidebook.  This is the next significant drainage south of Horsetail Falls on the west side of the east fork valley.

Around the base of the climb (45.43740, -110.91324), we found on an unshaded south facing aspect a snowpack of 30-40cm.  Icy crust layer for the bottom 8-10cm with 4F harness and then very fluffy new snow on top.

Lower down near the creek, the snowpack is thinner - much of the recent snow and wind transported snow is up in the trees.

Today, there was a quick dump of new snow, lasting about 30 minutes.  The sun came out briefly afterwards.

Our party got to the bottom of P1 and turned around.  While we knew the gully between pitches is relatively low angle, we were a bit uncertain about the size and positioning of hanging snowfields above and knew that today's forecast was considerable.  Something to revisit later.

From obs: "Yesterday 12/10/2023 at 0900, my climbing partner and I observed a clear crown line that extended throughout much of the east/ north east aspect of the bowl on Elephant Mountain. "

Yesterday 12/10/2023 at 0900, my climbing partner and I observed a clear crown line extend that extended throughout much of the east/ north east aspect of the bowl on Elephant Mountain. 

My partner and I were both surprised by the depth of the crown. The eastern most point of the crown (photo left) was the deepest. 
 

1 team yesterday (Saturday, not me) climbed Bobo Like and Big Sleep (first 2 pitches of each). They experienced 2x collapses but no other signed of instability.

From email: "Solo skier that released a small pocket of snow at the bottom of Super Couloir - he was not caught and it was just the recent new snow and it didn't run far."

From obs: "Windier then I expected today at me d elevations adjacent to Bridger ... Photos show lots of wind transport during the day. Felt a few collapses while skinning."

I snowshoed from the road to Garto Falls to the open meadow below the east face of Elephant. The snow depth varied significantly along the way, ranging from 2 inches to 18 inches at different points. Definitely some unstable spots where I broke through a crust that was about 3-6 inches above the ground, also some weird sinking in the newer snow from the past few days. Around 8,000 feet, the wind intensified, causing heavy drifting snow. This could be seen on every peak in the area.