[christensent]

All other vehicles were parked at China Point (about 11 miles from the Daniel Trailhead). Unless you have a vehicle which you have experience floating on spring snowpacks, that's about it. Might get another two miles in a week or two, past that it's deep. I took it to a little past Scatter Creek leaving 2.5 miles of skiing to the trailhead. Didn't want to get stuck out in those meadows at the end with no winch points.

The roughly 6 flat miles from parking was a bit tedious, especially on the way out. Half a dozen stream crossings but otherwise skinned the whole way. Did anyone lose their boat?

Once past all the flat, I made a very poor decision to start up a narrow couloir hoping it'd come out at the base of the Daniel Glacier since I didn't know how people usually get up here. It turns out it actually just had a big crack full-width and was impassable. Skied back down 800 feet and found the correct route a little further up the valley

Do not go up this gully

Setup camp at around 4900ft on the ridge

Left a little after 6am. The ridge was brutal post holing through breakable crust but once I got up onto the snowfield it was easy booting until it softened up a little then switched to skinning.

Turned around at 7200ft at the summit block at 8:30am since there was a few inches of wind slab on a few inches of fresh soft powder and I didn't want to mess with it being alone. It was very windy with rapid wind loading and some small sluffs of loose dry snow coming off near by peaks. Nothing froze up well at night and everything below 6000 feet skied miserably. Just feet of unconsolidated wet mush. Then just the long 6 mile walk back out and an uneventful drive out

[awilsondc]

Wow. I admire your ability to do that on multiple levels... the vehicle approach, the skinning and skiing, snow camping, route finding... pretty crazy. Not many people can do that, especially solo! Great decision to turn back when you did too. Thanks for the post, always nice to know what the conditions and snow pack are like this time of year.

[RichP]

[mbravenboer]

[Kat]

How was Scatter Creek, any pics? I'm interested in just how much it roars or is undercut during snow melt, but obviously you got thru it...

[christensent]

Scatter creek was maybe 3" deep, surprising. Most creek crossings have nice ramps because of the snowmobile use in the winter.

[Kat]

Wow, not what I expected at all - thanks for the pic. re: snowmobiles - they're still out there for spring riding, I'll bet that snowmobilers were a good portion of the folks parked at China Point and they didn't expect jeep ruts this early.

[DIYSteve]

You ascended The Chasm?

[christensent]

[DIYSteve]

[puzzlr]

Very interesting early season trip. I'm impressed by your stamina and your vehicle!

[GaliWalker]

[DIYSteve]

[GaliWalker]

BigSteve, I've been up that route to Pea Soup lake and some of the OP's photos look awfully like mine. Here is why I think he went up that route, and not up the chasm:

[DIYSteve]

Oh, okay