Close up photo of surface hoar

My wife shot these photos of surface hoar in Utah last week, where the nights were clear and cold. We found it mostly on north\shaded aspects. I thought it really represented the champagne glass scenario quite well - when I put a bunch of it my hand it quickly lost all structure and turned to something similiar to sugar.

I haven't seen surface at all in the past few years given that I ski mostly out here in the PNW, so this was really pretrty cool. It was easy to envision how a hard wind slab could slowly and carefully build itself on top.

Enjoy.

Great shots, Chris.
I shudder to think of how slippery a layer that would be covered with a couple of feet of heavy, consolidated snow.

Our snow often looks like that over here in the Wenatchee Mtns.

Here's some Snoqualmie Pass area surface hoar from the epic high pressure that was December: