We are from Washington too. I wish we had done some of the Pennsylvania schools including Lehigh and Penn over summer. Fall wasn’t an option due to her Fall sport. We could have way more easily swung a Fall visit to CMC. We toured CMC over summer and got a great vibe in fact I think it would have been her ED2 school had ED1 not worked out.
I agree with poster that Lehigh has a ton of ways to show demonstrated interest virtually with info sessions and virtual interviews.
We did several summer visits and I found she got a lot out of them. I agree a lot has to do with serendipity in terms of who you meet, who is on your tour, the weather…