Hey we may have crossed paths, we were coming out of Challenger on Sat via Hannegan. I'd go for a summit of Whatcom and traverse to the pass next time. The impasse was relatively painless but a bit tenuous getting down from the ledges through some touchy choss to the snow. Any moisture on the sloping stuff in there would make it quite hazardous. We came out by skirting the impasse way on skier's left in the trees to avoid the cliffed-out areas and grunted back up to the base of the impasse. After trying both, the impasse seems like the better of two evils. It seems like the difficulty of crossing it would fluctuate wildly depending on how much snow is in the gulley. The Whatcom approach is tempting just to avoid this decision.