Home > Trip Reports > 6/27/08- Summerland to lower Fryingpan to Panhandle Gap

6/27/08- Summerland to lower Fryingpan to Panhandle Gap

6/27/08
WA Cascades West Slopes South (Mt Rainier)
3416
5
Posted by skierlyles on 7/1/08 6:52am
Andy and I decided to head out to Summerland while it was still in and got a great tour. We had to carry skis much of the way and until the fryingpan creek bridge. Luckily there is a bridge in place as last year we had no such luxury. Another bonus- there are no blowdowns to negotiate along the way, speeding the boot into the Summerland Basin.

Once we reached the basin we strapped the skis on our feet and headed up in the quickly warming temps. We left early, but not early enough as at 9 the snow was already soft ( no significant refreeze overnight at low elevations) and while skinning we experienced some slippage. I can see ski crampons being useful for the upper sections, but we opted to transition to a bootpack the rest of the way to the Meany Crest. Bumped into a nice climber couple and soaked up the rays with them for a bit before we headed back up the mtn to just below pt. 7573'. Took a short break up there and gawked at the gigantic glacially formed cirque which used to contain portions of the lower Fryingpan Glacier (maybe a bit left but did not look like much). We saw runs over to the south which must have been a really lucky group as it looked like the best corn slopes around, I guess next time we will have to get up to the upper fryingpan and traverse over to that slope. Absolutely beautiful nonetheless!

From our perch we descended the northern slope near Meany crest and rounded the ridge to drop into the area containing the lower fryingpan. Here we felt dwarfed by the gigantic cirque and views in all directions were relished. We were able to climb without skins most of the way to Panhandle Gap and from there dropped in below the Sarvant Glacier. Snow here was sticky but not as suncupped as the Summerland basin so we were happy with our choice of descent. We followed the line skier's left and found the chute we eyed in the morning. We skied the drainage of the Sarvant all the way to fryingpan creek and had a blast! Now that the fun part was over we were in for some adventure... creek crossing was no easy affair and we managed to find a decently shallow area to cross( thigh to hip deep and quickly moving- scary). Andy went first and made it across without a hitch, I made it across by the skin of my teeth and happily stopped to dry my shoes and socks for a moment while the adrenaline wore off. After the interesting stream crossing we realized there was no easy way out of the stream bank and we utilized some tree branches to help get us out. After some sap filled huffing and puffing we made it back to the trail and managed to cut off a mile or so of trail hiking, sweet!

We then arrived at the car to 2 stream iced IPA's courtesy of Andy, very nice!!!

Summerland and the environs could be good for a bit longer and certainly the Fryingpan looks ripe, go get it, such a beautiful area of the park.

Chris

pics below-

1-our descent route scoped from the hike in...

2-me dropping into remnants of lower sarvant

3-Andy dropping into Chute

few more here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/christopherlyles/SummerlandFryingpanSarvant?authkey=cdfLTzMYrII&pli=1&gsessionid=XKJpwBPHPbcaY6cThRAc4g
Nice chute Chris.
River crossing looked sketchy though.
I was on a tour with Charles on the interglacier two years ago and when crossing the Interfork, one of our party,( not me or Charles )fell in, full submersion. After stripping down ( not  a pretty sight) and drying clothes partly on some sun baked rocks, the tour continued. I was impressed .

So THAT was your ski for the week  8)

Very nice work ,rarely done  it 's been on my list for years.
Thanks for the report .

nice one! I've been wondering about that chute the last couple of trips up there.

author=Scotsman link=topic=10532.msg42691#msg42691 date=1214969980]
Nice chute Chris.
River crossing looked sketchy though.
I was on a tour with Charles on the interglacier two years ago and when crossing the Interfork, one of our party,( not me or Charles )fell in, full submersion. After stripping down ( not  a pretty sight) and drying clothes partly on some sun baked rocks, the tour continued. I was impressed .


the river crossing was sketchy- i almost took a dive. that creek is always an interesting crossing... last year i went up with a group of mountaineers and 3 of the 5 fell in.



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6-27-08-summerland-to-lower-fryingpan-to-panhandle-gap
skierlyles
2008-07-01 13:52:26