Basic Glacier Climb - Mount Baker/Coleman Glacier

Sunny weather and calm winds. Forecast with a chance of afternoon thunderstorm but we did not encounter any thunderstorms.

Started apprx 3 a.m. from the trailhead, summited at 11 a.m., back to the cars around 4:30 p.m. Several parties en route but had the summit to ourselves.

From the trailhead, we encountered snow on the trail about an hour in. We took the early season approach to the glacier. On the glacier, there was a kicked step route the whole way to the summit. The whole time we were on the glacier, the snow was slightly soft to post-holing, never icy. Crevasses were in good shape on the traditional Coleman-Deming route. Be careful of the ice fall zone- there was evidence of previous ice fall. We heard sounds of distant ice falling also.

On the way down, since it was warm, there was postholing. We took a variation of the route down past the ice fall zone cutting across the bowl to Castle Rock camp-- on this portion of the climb were quite a few closed crevasses and one larger crevasse that had a small snow bridge. In retrospect, it also put us in the glide path of potential ice fall longer than absolutely necessary. Thus , we would recommend sticking to the original Coleman-Deming route  up and down. On the portion of the early season approach connecting the glacier back to the trail, in the afternoon, we had to be very careful not to step through the snow to the creek underneath.

Overall, great day out with a a great team :)