Hiked the Mount Si trail on a Friday morning starting at 9:20am. The entrance to the parking road has many potholes; it's not too bad for a low clearance vehicle if you go slowly. There were a good number of cars already in the parking lot.
The trail is well-maintained and has a pretty even incline throughout, except for the last stretch which is steeper. The trail finally breaks out of the canopy near the top. On a clear day, you're greeted with expansive mountain views, with Mt Rainier in all its glory. At 11:40am, I reached the "lunch spot" on the talus slope. I found it hard to follow the trail here, and decided to get lunch on the slope as I wasn't planning on doing the haystack. This is a great spot to take in the views: Mount Rainier, the Olympics, Rattlesnake Lake, and Seattle and Bellevue in the distance.
I started the descent at 12:30pm and took a short detour via the Old Si trail. The Old Si trail is shorter, steeper and less busy, so I figured I'd check it out to cut down on some distance until the point it meets the regular trail. I'm glad I didn't take this detour on the way up because it is much steeper than the regular trail. The descent is fairly quick because the even decline keeps you moving. I was back at the parking lot at 2pm. The overall hike (no haystack) took 4 hr 40 mins, including a 50 min lunch break and several short breaks on the way up.
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