The access road has recently been opened on weekends only on this popular hike. There was a ""Road Closed"" sign at the begining but a hand lettered sign confirmed it was open. There were about five cars in the parking lot on a wetish day. The trail starts in dense hemlock spruce forest and soon passes several interesting basalt towers. The trail seems to be in a stage of reconstruction and does not follow the USGS path. Several waterfalls were passed falling down cliffs and at several points running down the trail. The fog lifted to reveal views out to the south. While the trail only gains 1600' it seems much longer and the vegetation changes markedly. There were many flowers including a pink lily not seen in Washington. You come out above treeline onto steep meadows where stairways have been constrcted on the steep section, unfortunatly they have decayed leaving some nasty steps. After the final stairway you emerge on the small fenced summit. When the fog lifted the view was amazing. You can see the line of breakers on the coast the mouth of the Columbia, Astoria, and even the Olympics. All in all the trail is a welcome diversion from the beach. My understanding is that it gets quite crowded in better weather.