July 08, 2012, Mt Baker, Squak Gl

Just a quick condition report from the last Sunday for those thinking about.  The road is almost melted out to the TH, probably by this weekend.  We took partially Scot Paul trail, mostly straight up from the meadow.  Skinned all the way, but barely worth it in the forest on hard pine covered snow.  Then camped near Crag View under clear sky, no wind and warm air.  Kinda nice not to hurry up and down.

The snow didn't freeze overnight and easy skinning to the summit.  It was windy once we reached the crater edge.  There were about half dozen people on the summit.  The new snow earlier last week was not yet consolidated well.  The upper ~1000' skied well, then got pretty soupy down to ~7000'.  It should be much better by now.

We traversed toward the std approach one creek shy of Railroad Grade, then headed down on very cuppy snow.  Heard from other skier about the creek crossing issue on the main trail.  Maybe somebody could chime in.  Over all it is great Summer skiing as usual.