Overall an awesome hike! About 3200ft elevation gain in just under 2 miles. Trail starts out straight up and easy to find for the first half. After climbing 2,000ft, you will come to a nice flat spot with great views. It's a good spot to take a short break before finishing the final 1200ft. The trail can get a little confusing if you aren't paying attention, and the fog didn't help much either. By the time we reached the top, the fog overpowered any views. For my first rock scramble, there was a lot of roots, rocks, and branches to hold onto which made the exposure not seem as bad. Tracking poles were extremely helpful on the way down. It was Labor Day weekend and the trail wasn't even crowded (unlike the Mt Ellinor trailhead)... We saw only 3 people on the trail.

If you are looking to be demoralized, abused and risk many a potential twisted ankle at any point, all the while looking down (literally) on those doing Mount Ellinor, then Mount Washington is for you. The trail starts near a boulder opposite the parking lot by 15 feet or so. It's not marked, as I don't believe this is even an official ONF trail. There is a waterfall just past the boulders blocking the road, but save a soak in that for your weary self after the hike. If you go farther down, there is a trail, but it leads to a steeper class climbing ascent of the mountain I believe. Once on the trail, you start going up. And up. And up. A blow down is present about an 1/8 of a mile in. Keep on climbing and you'll soon be using four points of contact to climb up roots and squeeze by tight spaces. Be especially careful of the roots. They are far more slippery than the rocks. After a half mile in you get to a little clearing that has a stream flowing through it. There are water sources going up, but here is a good place if you've gone through some of yours already. Here you will cross the creek to the north and find a rocky gully on the right. Follow this up and it will turn into a trail. After a little bit, you will come out into scree field with a large boulder. Follow the trail to the right of that boulder and on up. You will go into the trees again and then come out to a meadow area at around 4,900/5,000'. This part really gives you jaw-dropping views of the area around you. The area still has a lot of snow. I highly recommend an ice axe/crampons or microspikes and to go early in the morning when things are still frozen. I didn't make it to this area until around 10am and the snow was already slushy as it was hit by the sun first. Continue going up the snowfield (around 5,000') and to the left where you will ascend a bit and then cross horizontally above an area of rocks. Continue NE towards the summit just below a pyramid shaped peak above you. If you are paying attention to detail just below and to the right of the pyramid shaped peak (your left) are a couple of white memorial plaques (around 5,700') and a cross honoring a climber who died there back in 2003. If you climbed up to check this out go back N heading towards Washington. It was about here a mountain goat walked right in front of me, about 15 feet away. Little did he know he was leaving me a nice hoof pack of steps leading nearly to the summit to follow. You will descend a little bit and then cross an open area and ridge that leads up to Washington. How you get up to the summit is up to you. The path becomes a bit muddled here. There is supposed to be a small catwalk that leads around up to the summit, but I didn't find it, maybe I was just too tired. There are good hand holds going up, but be careful, it is exposed and class 3. Give a big wahoo! and head back down. Be very careful if you are coming down later in the day (It was 2pm by the time I was heading down), the snow got even worse. There are some well-exposed slopes you have to cross where the potential to fall and get injured is great . After I descended a bit I was able to start safely glissading down saving me heaps of time. I met what I presumed to be the same mountain goat heading down. He stared at me and then followed me as I gave him a wide berth heading down. After a couple mins, he moved on and so did I. I made it back to the car in one piece. I walked down to the waterfall and soaked my achy feet in the freezing water and then took off. Resources: Check out the Washington Scrambles book for good route info or more reports here on WTA. Also, see link below for an Outdoor Society blog on Mt Washington.

Basic south (summer) route trail is now closed off due to snow and ice once the trail reaches the rock base of the mountain. Much more snow then reported. At the meadow below the base of the mountain, there was ~50 cm to 60 cm in wind loaded areas. The section of trail that starts on the rock, after crossing the meadow, with the thin ledge, is impassable due to snow/ice, requiring protection --such as a handline. Turned around due to conditions.

On Saturday I had some afternoon plans in Shelton, so Colin and I decided to hit up the Olympics for some early morning peak-bagging. Thanks to some recent beta from a few NwHikers-http://www.nwhikers.net Colin and I were able to make a confident attempt at Mount Washington. We drove through Hoodsport around 6:30 as the morning light crept in. After turning left on road 2419 a small coyote(or possibly a fox?) leaped onto the road and began running up it as if we were in hot pursuit. We followed behind in amusement as it sprinted up the road with no apparent intention to head for the woods on either side. After a minute or so we backed off to give the road-running coyote a chance to leave the road, but when we continued on a few minutes later we quickly caught up as it caught it's breath and then finally decided to retreat into the brush. I misread the trail's location just north of the junction for road 014 to the Mount Ellinor Trailhead. Instead we took the turn, realizing the mistake as we stopped to admire the pre-dawn light just before arriving at the trailhead. Conditions: The last 2 miles of forest road had an inch of compact snow and ice in the ruts. Microspikes were useful from the get go, there were several thick cascades of ice covering the trail before the basin. The trail itself was pretty overgrown but well traveled and easy to read. We mostly followed someone's path where it wasn't covered in drifting snow, opting for the frozen creek bed over the snowy bushwhack for some of the section just above the basin. Near the top was less than 6" of snow, except for a few small fields which were several feet deep. We found very little firm snow above 4000 feet. If it were much deeper some movement seemed very possible. Most of the summit block was dry, with a light dusting on the West face. Loose snow above exposure blocked the bootpath ~60 feet below the summit. The dog stopped there, but we managed to scramble up the exposed West face. The trail before and after the basin was some of the most painful travel over tons of blowdowns and through thick snow-covered brush. A few peaks on the Ellinor-Washington Ridge were bathed in alpenglow when we reached the basin. However, neither summit is visible from there. We came armed with a great route description but ended up following what looked like a single pair of tracks, which stayed on the bootpath wherever it was visible. Above the four small peaks South of the main ridge we carefully crossed 3 steep slopes exposed slopes, the second and third of which had only a few feet of run-out before a long vertical drop. Rainier, Adams, and Saint Helens were barely visible between the low sun and some haze, but from the saddle the Olympics were clear as day. Maverick needed a boost and some encouragement a few times to make it across the final traverse below the summit, but to continue with him would have been far too dangerous. Just past the overhung bivy spot on the bootpath ~60 feet below the summit to the SE we stopped where a deep snow bank covered the path above some serious exposure. Colin back-tracked a bit and found an exposed scramble route up the West face that I thought was only a little sketchy, and mostly due to the loose snow scattered around. The summit register is a collection of notebooks and loose paper, but there is a working pen! We traded off visiting the top and hanging with the dog and then hurried down to make it back to Kapowsin Air Sports before sunset. A group of six were making their way up as we crossed paths after leaving the ridge top. We made it down to the truck less than 2 hours after leaving the top and had just enough time to stop in Shelton for a quick skydive before heading home. This epic adventure concludes my time with aDam the Fazed beaver. He is now off to Massachusetts for some new scenery. pics and route map @ http://www.jebsjourneys.com/2013/12/mount-washington-olympic-national.html

We hit this beautiful trail during the week last week and it went pretty well. About 1.8 miles in or so it got pretty snowy on the trail. My friend was wise enough to bring snow boots while I went a little ill-prepared with only tennis shoes and jeans and while I powered through it, my feet were soaked. The snow got gradually deeper the higher we reached to probably more than 4 feet. I would definitely bring snow boots and poles for this one if you want to keep your feet dry. We got a little confused as we kept climbing due to thinking it was only going to be about 2 miles one way, but seemed like much more. We reached an open valley area, which didn't seem to be the end, but decided to turn back as we ran out of the time. The view and the trail were gorgeous and definitely worth trying out yourself.