Snow report Upper Black Forest, 01/29/2020

Snow condition

It's hard to say how much fresh snow there was, but it should have been around 20cm above 1,100m. This means that tours in the Feldberg area are possible again. Most of the rocks are now well snowed in (knowledge of the area remains an advantage). However, it's still nothing to do with a good winter, especially as recently only the slopes at the very top of the Feldberg really had a closed snow cover.

Snow quality

According to the reports from other places on Thursday, I wasn't expecting too much. The fresh snow was quite compact due to the wind, but still not really difficult and nice to cruise. The wind had picked up considerably during the tour and with the rain that set in later, which unfortunately is likely to continue, the fun will soon be over again.

The wind has once again blown the snow extremely into the steep slopes on the Feldberg, and the cornices in the Zastler look correspondingly thick. On the Baldenweger, where I was out and about, it looks as if the cornice is virtually covered with the transported snow. I was only able to observe superficially detached drift snow packs of low thickness and with the change in the weather today, the avalanche danger will probably increase drastically.

Overall impression

As I wrote in the introduction, it was probably only really good until this afternoon, so three stars is already too many, but my experience today was worth four, low expectations and the best day of the season in the snow so far. I was able to use half the day today and was practically alone and the first in the area.