March 5-6, 2005, Van Trump

Seemed like a good weekend to do one of those tours typically done in early summer.  We decided to be optimistic that the flip-flopping forecast would be better than expected, and it paid off.
I made the mistake of assuming since there was no snow on the ground at the Van Trump trailhead that overnight parking would not be a problem...but the ranger at the permit office informed us that despite the lack of snow, overnight parking was limited to paradise or longmire....hmmm...our options were rather limited.  But we were on our way after shuttling our gear up to the trailhead, me driving back to longmire, and mooching a ride back to the trailhead (i maintain that asking for a lift from a fellow backcountry skier is not 'thumb out on the side of the road hitchhiking' which i know is not allowed in the park).
We hiked all the way to treeline in running shoes, warm enough to wear shorts the whole way...what time of year is this?... Only took about two hours to get to van trump park even with overnight packs. Got in a couple short yoyos before returning to the megamid for the evening.  
The snow didn't freeze completely overnight, but the crust was good enough for easy booting when it got to steep for skinning. We topped out on the ridge between the van trump glaciers and the turtle snowfield and continued up a few hundred feet up the turtle.  Icy conditions above and a lack of crampons or axes made us decide our turn-around point was good enough. An easy pace had us midway up the turle snowfield from our camp at treeline after about four hours of hiking and skinning. Started heading down around noon and by then most of the suncrust had been cooked away.
The snow was variable on the turtle....12" of mashed potatoes mixed with a solid 3" windslab, alternating between the two made for interesting turns, but once we swung back around onto a southern exposure the snow improved..6-8" of slop that improved to almost-corn below about 8000'.  We ran into a group of three skiers on their way up, they'd started from the car that morning...figure they'd already done about 5000' on their way to a 7000 vf day trip.  The last 1000ft to camp was great corn, felt like mid-May.  
The skis were back on the packs at treeline and the hike to the trailhead went fast...fortunately there was no shortage of friendly day hikers that we met on the way down who were happy to help us get back to our car at longmire.
With the gate at longmire opening so early these days it certainly seems feasible to do this tour in a day, but just an fyi, if you want to get up there for an overnighter, there are a few logistical challenges to work out.  :)