TL;DR: Only 1 mile snow-free then a messy situation! Skiers- you can start skinning about 2.8 miles in but it’s kind of awful for a while until you get closer to the basin. Snow bridge over the Inter Fork of the White River is there but going fast if you want to ski the Inter Glacier. Nice corn around 10/11am today! You’ll see our long glissade track from Camp Curtis.
We hiked the Glacier Basin Trail to climb Mount Rainier, entering 5/27/25 and exiting 5/30/25. The trail is snow-free for the first mile then intermittently snow-covered for a short stretch then continuously snow-covered to the Glacier Basin meadows area. The snow is covered with pine needles, branches, and other organic debris… plus lumpy with some cavities over hollow spaces to watch out for and some treacherous spots where you could punch through the snow. There are 2 spots where the trail’s bridges aren’t fully accessible due to snow so you have to cross running streams on tricky snow bridges- which will only get sketchier as the snow melts. As you approach the end of the trail there’s a set of footprints that wander off route so keep that in mind!
Easy to collect water from the river once you reach the Glacier Basin meadows area (totally under snow of course right now).
Camp Schurman- one bathroom open and you can drop off your human waste bags in the barrel by the bathrooms. Lots of snow still there - see pictures.
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