On the topic of snow instability this past saturday, I had an incident of my
own.  My friends and I decided, on account of the suprising snow
accumulations and lift closings due to high winds, to head out to Jay Peak.
 The quad was running but that was it.  We really only wanted to ski the top
and big jay any way, so we decided to forgoe buying lift tickets.  We were
hoping to sneak a ride part way up on the lift, but the liftie woudn't have
it.  So we snowshoed and skinned up the trails.  We finally finished our
hike at the summit and after a little break, skied valhalla.  It was sick,
thigh deep consistently.  We were super excited to hit up big jay after this
and proceded to hike back.  Long story short we hiked out to big jay over
the saddle.  I'd only done big jay once but my friend's had more experience.
 After hiking for an hour we realized that the tracks we were following were
wrong, and it led us to a drop in we were unfamiliar with.  After much
debate, it was complete white out, we decided on a line and dropped in.  We
had aimed for fresh tracks and were shocked to find the snow to be chest
deep!!!!! Our initial joy was short lived however.  There was just too much
snow to even carry us forward, not steep enough.  After we decended about 40
feet we stopped to evaluate our situation.  It became apparment that there
was risk of slides, getting lost, getting stuck in the flats at the bottom,
 cliffing out, and worst of all risking falling into a tree well and being
completely covered by snow.  We were exhausted from a day of intense hiking
and battling deep snow.  It was one of the toughest decisions I've had to
make, but all things considered we decided the risks weren't worth it and we
hiked out.  

I'm relatively new to backcountry skiing and the knowledge of northern
vermont mountains.  I had no idea that anywhere out east could accumulate so
much snow.  It's weird to have to think about dangers in snowpack out here,
but it's still a legitamate threat.  Maybe it's finally time to shell out
the money for Avi 1.  - Kyle 

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