Excellent, but very cold, day of skiing on Dec 30th, witih big blue skies.
We toured up a well-packed trail along Commonwealth Creek, behind The Fist.
Snow was very cold and often "stuttered" on our skins.
Found a beauty of a run down a gully between Mount Smuts and The Fist: we followed an established up-track for 1/4 of the route, set our own trail up to treeline. With the sun on the slope, we decided not to push for the saddle/summit and skied down some glorious powder, sticking close to the trees. No whoomping or cracking, snow felt anchored.
Inversion today mid-way up the gully.
Could see across the valley to Commonwealth Peak, where a size 2 (?) slide was naturally triggered on the Shark's Tooth side of that route. When we started our day, we could see a small slide on Shark's Tooth near the top, then the rest of that slope was triggered as the sun warmed up the rocks. It's a very steep slope, but the slide came 2/3 of the way into the bowl.
Be safe out there!
