he bitterly cold wind of yesterday was gone, and with it the cloud. But that Antarctic blast had left a snowpack hard as concrete, though far more aesthetic than any concrete could ever be. Indeed, the utterly magnificent scene surrounding me was the antithesis of concrete. Draped over slender ridges, elegant spurs and steep faces—its smooth folds delineated by the late morning shadows—the spring snowpack was not only beautiful; it lent an added sense of remoteness and
