We started up the Little Si trail and at about 1/2 mile, took the second entrance to the Boulder Garden Loop Trail. Here is the deal; if you like going up steep inclines but don't like going down as much, like me, take the second entrance to the Boulder Garden Loop Trail, climb like a mountain goat for about 3/4 mile. You will reach the high point of the loop trail where you will see the Mt. Si. old trail going up on the left. Now go up Mt. Si. It is steep in places, but if you made it to the cutoff, you should be fine. There are no blowdowns and you won't lose the trail. When you come back down and get to the loop trail, head to the left. It is probably 1 1/2 miles back to the first entrance of the Loop Trail off the Little Si trail, but it is graded for a grandma and you can walk it out in no time. Plus the boulder garden will be on your left as you are coming down.

Ideal conditions on Mt Si right now. Set out on Little Si trail w/ Woody & his son Luke. Took the second Boulder Garden Loop fork to the right & after 3/4 mile or so the Old Si trail is to the left. Soon after I noticed a 35 pound weight wedged into the rock wall. Looks like somebody made quite the effort to put it in there. This trail is a little bit more direct & steeper than the main Si trail. Also far less crowded. We saw 2 others going up & just a few coming down. When the Old Si trail comes real close to the main trail (just after 3 miles or so) we opted to go over to the main trail & hike that trail the rest of the way up. No snow on the trail up to Haystack Basin. A little snow on trail near the base of the Haystack. We opted to ascend the Haystack since it was dry all the way up. Gorgeous views on this bluebird day. Mt Baker & Glacier Peak to the north. Mt Rainier to the south. Olympics to west w/ Seattle & Bellevue in foreground. And many other still snow-covered lower peaks to east along Snoqualmie corridor. Met a nice guy named Brandon going up to the Haystack. He was from Atlanta out here for work conference for a few days. His Seattle workmates recommended Mt Si to him. Good choice for this day. Cheers Brandon if you read this - hope you caught up w/ your workmates at the pubs in Seattle. We spent about 1/2 hour at the top. Only 4 of us for awhile until others showed up. As we were coming down the chute, quite a few people were coming up. With the traffic jam it was almost reminiscent of the Hillary Step on Everest! We descended the Old Si trail and went left at Boulder Garden Loop trail to complete the loop. A stop at Scott's Dairy Freeze in North Bend completed a great day.

Even though it was a very stormy wet day with very high avalanche danger, we wanted to get some elevation gain and a good workout. Party of 3 headed out from the Little Si trailhead around 10:45am, just a couple cars there.

We took the Little Si Trail to the Boulder Garden Loop- first turn to the right and wound up the hill past the lovely mossy boulders. It was a storm, so it wasn’t unexpected to find the trail quite wet, with some very large puddles covering the trail in places. About a mile up, at a junction not-so-helpfully marked as the “Boulder Garden Loop”, we turned right and headed up to summit Mt Si via the old trail. From the end of the Boulder Garden Loop we took, this is the *second* such sign along the trail.

The Old Si Trail is in good condition, as usual. With the stormy weather there were considerable puddles and water along the trail, but again, this was to be expected. This is a steeper trail than some, so it was a bit slippery in places with the mud/water/detritus, but I found it manageable with sturdy boots. Past the intersection of the “Northwest Passage” unmaintained trail that leads back to the main Mt Si Trail, the rain started to turn gradually more slushy as we ascended, but we didn’t reach true snow until perhaps 3,000 feet of elevation. (no altimeter, just a guess).

Once in the snow, traction devices were necessary for safe travel. 2 in our party had microspikes, which were excellent for conditions, the 3rd had snowshoes- which worked well enough when necessary. I’d pick spikes over snowshoes because there were intermittent bare areas between areas with deeper snow. The snow was packed hard enough to not posthole into it, but I could see evidence of past postholing in sections. It wasn’t hard to follow the trail, although experience with the trail was helpful towards the junction with the Old Si trail. Close to the junction and beyond was wet fresh snow, which was rather slippery at times.

Reached the top of the trail but chose not to try for the area below the Haystack as the snowshoes as traction devices didn’t seem appropriate there with all the exposed rock. No nosy birds after our snacks this time! I was very glad to have the traction devices and poles for the slippery way down the snowy section of the trail. We didn’t see anyone from trailhead in the morning, to trailhead return around 3pm. I’d highly recommend coming prepared for snow and cold if you want to take this trail. I learned that my softshell definitely doesn't perform in a downpour like this one- it was worth it to have proper raingear in the pack. :)

The Old Mt. Si trail is accessed from the Boulder Garden Loop Trail off of the Little Mt. Si Trail. The old trail is rougher & steeper then the new trail and and is shorter by approx. a mile. The great thing though is that it has much less traffic and is more secluded then the new trail. Snow began @ approx. the 2500' mark and that is where I donned the micro spikes. After ascending and descending the old trial I then hiked up Little Mt Si which had it's typical high traffic level but was snow free.