Mount Ellinor (winter)

Wednesday December 30th, 2015
My observations for my scouting mission.

Access:
Road to lower trailhead is snowed in. At best, with tire chains and AWD/4WD, can make it to Skinwood creek pull off. Lower trailhead is inaccessible due to (100 cm) snowpack on the road.
I heard that the past weekend had overlanders out with their big trucks and no one made it to the Lower Trailhead.
Access is best from Big Creek.

Trail Conditions:
Snowshoes are necessary, specifically by the second bench on the Big Creek Trail. There is now a groomed snowshoe track all the way to the Winter/Summer junction. The trail to the base of the chute should also be well defined and somewhat groomed.

Winter Route:
Probed the snowpack and there's more than 200+ Centimetres/2+ meters at the base of the chute; my ruler only goes to 2 meters and I didn't hit ground yet.
Current conditions for the winter route are unfavourable due to unconsolidated snow. Attempted winter chute with snowshoes and still sunk 90 cm with each step. I only made it 1/10 of the way up.

Concerns:
There's a lot of snow in the tree's and as the day warms up, there were significant snow-tree-bombs.