3-22-2009 Kicking around South Fork Bishop Creek

I got up early and did a nice short tour in the South Fork of Bishop Creek.

I found a nice option on the west side of the canyon across from the Table Mountain Group Campground. Skinning up I found the full range of snow conditions: settled powder, wind board, breakable wind crust, sun crust and corn.

Remember: Click on the photo to enlarge it!!

The picture below shows my route. Red is my ascent route and blue is my descent.
There were nice views up canyon with Cloudripper Peak and subpeaks center left and Picture Puzzle Peak distant right.
The protected trees held the settled powder which provided some nice skiing.
I really had to pay attention to the aspect. Very subtle changes made the difference between fun snow and very difficult snow. The textured snow on the right was fine, the smooth snow on the left was nasty sun crust.
I got down out of trees and into more open terrain and things got more "interesting." The area circled in red was a bit trying, but I bumbled my way through without falling. I actually found some decent corn for several turns down below the red circle.
I noticed someone had apparently been caught in a small wet snow avalanche. Click to enlarge and you will notice two tracks at the bottom of the slide, but only one set of tracks above that. It looks like the second skier set it off.
A nice outing for sure - until I got back to my vehicle (The Suzuki) and found the battery dead.
Ugh.
Oh well.