April 3, 2011, Snoqualmie Pass wandering

4 people and one dog climbed the phantom towards snoqualmie peak.  Low-lying clouds made for poor vis, but made us hopeful that NWAC's dire predictions about sun warming wouldn't come to pass.  The snow on the climb was reasonably light, though a 2 minute window of sun noticeably dampened it.  Amazing how quickly powder degrades this time of year - I guess winter's over.  Our late start meant we'd be beaten to the slot, so we chose laziness and fresh tracks and skied down the couloir that's usually climbed to return to Alpental from the slot.  The new snow slid immediately off the crust at the steep section up top, but as it grew flatter we got some nice buttery powder turns (with lots of buried death cookies).  From the Basin below Snoqualmie's couloirs we headed west to a saddle, awkwardly climbed a ridge a bit towards a peak to the north, then dropped down steeply then very flat to Snow Lake.  Mashed potatoes everywhere; despite the clouds things got warm quickly in the afternoon.  On the steeper parts of that short descent the snow slid very easily over crust, and it was wet enough to cohere and look slabby.  Would have been scary on a longer or more exposed slope.  From Snow Lake we climbed up to the Source Lake basin.  We'd been worried about this descent, the only serious south-facing slope of the day, but the whole damn basin was covered in large debris under a foot of powder.  Not fun skiing, but eased our concerns about sluffs entraining wet snow from last week. 
All in all, not a bad day.  Probably won't do the Snoqualmie Peak to Snow Lake crossing again, but it could have promise for good steep tree skiing in the right conditions. 

Snowpack assessment: powdery, degrading to heavy snow by afternoon, even under clouds.  The newest snow had slab potential when wet.  The Source Lake basin seems to have taken a huge beating (so maybe less worry about buried weak layers?), and the basin below the slot couloir had plenty of debris, but doesn't seem to have undergone the same purging.