Quick one up Cable Line. Muddy with running water, very slippery for first 300 vertical feet. After that, dry and good to go. Poles were helpful

no views due to weather 

Great training hike with good views at top. Muddy trail part way, but otherwise dry/completely doable. 

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Itinerary: Took Cable Line trail up to West Tiger 3 summit, then took West Tiger trail down, and then hopped back onto Cable Line trail down to the TH. ~4mi roundtrip, ~2 hours (including short break at summit)

Arrived at TH around 9:30AM. Several cars already lining the road outside the Cable Line TH entrance. 

Lots of mud and wet/damp leaves lining the trail for the first .5-1Mi of the trail. Be careful where you step, it is definitely slippery. I would recommend poles. However, I did see some trail runners cut right through it, so it really depends on your comfort level!

Rest of the trail was dry. Checked out the clearing at the summit--amazing views, but was it worth chopping the trees? A question several hikers I ran into were asking. Snapped some photos and headed back down. West Tiger trail going down is in great condition, some mud and wet leaves here and there but nothing terrible. Be careful going down on Cable line with the mud and leaves.

Cheers! 

We arrived at the Cable Line TH close to 0730 with no cars around. There is only 1 tree down over the Cable line route and it’s easy to walk over.  There’s a thick layer of downed yellow big leaf maple leaves on much of the trail in the first mile or so.  Removed a few fallen branches.  No running water on the trail this am.  The cable route trail leading to the summit area has an orange barricade and a large tree down to keep people off the summit.  The regular trail still has an orange barricade close to the summit.   From a little distance, the summit itself looks like tree debris was cleared and there are no trees standing.  One of the large sitting rocks remains. The wind seemed to be howling at 30 mph since there is less protection (and it’s a stormy day).  Glad to have shells and layers even though we had no rain. The most impressive tree clearing is off to the right, or west of the summit.  There is a large swath of trees removed which reveals all the valleys below which were never visible in the past.  Heading down the regular (WT3) trail we encountered a few more people and 4 or 5 downed trees across the trail which are easy to get over.  Most of these trees are in the lower half of the hike down.  Trail otherwise in great shape with no running water.

Barricades are still there just below the summit of WT3. Got some decent views today from behind the barricade over towards WT2,as you can actually see Mt Rainier now. From the overlook coming up the WT3 trail you can now see that the trees have been cleared away from the radio tower on WT2. Look forward to when they open up the top to check out the views!

The top 300 vertical feet to the summit is still closed due to tree clearance. Still made for a great rainy day run.