Jaime Hood and I climbed the East Ridge of Temple yesterday, July 6th. It was a warm night, with little in the way of a freeze. We measured +10 degrees at the parking lot at 4am. The route was dry to the top of the big step. The ledges traversing to the base of the Black Towers are covered in steep snow accumulated over the winter. We had good soft snow here, providing deep boot packing conditions, but the traverse was still time consuming and felt exposed and committing. The Chimney marking the beginning of the Black Towers climbing is almost completely buried in snow. A small cairn on top of the chimney marking the first bolt anchor is just above the snow level. Most of the Black Towers climbing was dry. One anchor was buried under snow. We climbed on snow for one pitch in the middle and climb a bit of ice and snow on the exit pitch. We witnessed several natural cornice falls flushing the gullies in the black towers region climbers left from the route. The snow ridge to the summit was straight forward, providing mostly deep bucket steps and a few short ice spots. The descent was mostly snow free; some slushy snow on the trail on the upper mountain and a couple 50m long snow patches to cross mid mountain.
Overall I'd hesitate to say the route is "in shape" as the ledge traverse is much more challenging than it would be if dry. It felt like it will be awhile before this snow has melted back significantly to provide more straight forward travel.

Simon Meis