July 4, Little Tahoma (minus 300 feet)

Started out from the Summerland trailhead at the gentlemanly hour of 0850. Hiked up to the Frying Pan Creek bridge (with my wife, who was hiking Summerland but not skiing) with patchy snow becoming pretty solid at about 4,800 feet. Switched to skins at the bridge (5,200€™) where the snow coverage was continuous. Excellent skinning conditions up Meany Crest (booted about 200 feet of the headwall) and on to the Whitman glacier saddle at about 9,000€™. A couple of inches of new snow from Tuesday made for perfectly smooth corn with about an inch of penetration. Skinned (with crampons) up the steepening Whitman glacier then booted about 200€™ to the top of the continuous snow at 10,800€™. Having reached my turnaround time of 3:00 pm (and also being quite knackered) decided to forgo the 300 foot scramble to the summit and skied down. Conditions were as good as I have seen them on this route; perfectly smooth and non-grabby corn without a single boot mark or skin track on it €“ bliss! I didn€™t see a single person from the trail head until the creek crossing on the way down. Didn€™t see any major signs of instability, just a few small wet point releases, and a cool breeze kept the snow perfect. An easy hike out brought me back to the car at 5 pm. Should be good for a while, although the heat will gradually degrade the snow, I guess.