Disregard the previous trip report dated June 24th. I found this hike to be very scenic, a good workout, lots of wildflowers and views, a lovely summit ridge for lunch, and easy to find if you are with someone who's been up here in the past. Trail markings are poor, due to--I'm told--a private property owner--but lots of folks find their way up Mt Washington, most months of the year, including many rock climbers. While there are some rocks on the trail, anyone with proper boots should have no problem--at least in dry conditions. The creek crossing was not a problem. Too many photos here:

http://www.flickr.com/[…]/

This was a hike that almost wasn't. We couldn't find the trail head because the directions said something about Twin Fall section which the signboard at the actual location said "homestead" site. Also, the trail head was not "next" to the restroom. So we thought we were at the wrong place. So we keep driving further south. Then we came back and noticed that the trail head was actually about 100 ft away and blocked by a large car.
So we hiked up and I pretty much hated it all the way up. Rocks. Rocks. Rocks. All the way up to the "bench" which we passed because I thought it would be a wooden bench not a rock formation. So we kept going up. It was okay but I definitely would not do this hike again. The rocks were killer coming down for my ankles. The only really nice part of the hike were the rock climbing walls and semi-caves on the way up. The views were not that great. All I remember is the rocks!!!

For being a hike that is difficult to find trail descriptions for, this turned out to be a well-traveled and enjoyable hike. We weren't sure of the distance to the summit before starting out. At about 2.5 miles we encountered snow on the trail (for 1-2 miles) and occasional mud. We think the summit is about 5-6 miles from the trail head. Nice views of Chester Morse Lake.

It was a great hike. We left trailhead at 3:30pm and arrived at the summit around 7pm. then rally cruised to get tot parking lot just at the edge of night.

We intended this to be as its listed here, a 4 mile round trip of 1600 feet elevation gain. Summit post has it listed as 12 miles round trip and 3400 feet elevation gain to 4420 feet high. We are sure that this guide book is wrong as it was much further than indicated here. Another post said it was 10 miles round trip. Either way its more than we bargained for.

All the same we really enjoyed it. We hit snow about half way up and continued on. We lost the main trail and started a boot trail that was pretty much a straight up climb. The boot trail was not bushwhacking, we could tell a real boot trail was there. This was really fun. When you get to the torn out earth dam take a right instead of a left to do the boot trail. It was snow covered most of the way. We kept wondering where the top was at 1600 feet of climbing, little did we know...

On the way down we found the actual trail and stuck to it. It was much easier of a descent than the boot trail we figured, because the steep snow would have been difficult to manage in the lowering light.

so it’s a good one, but not an good afternoon hike really as its too long, unless you are a tough person. So beware the bad information in this guide as to length and height. I put in a request for an edit. I hope they fix it for the next hikers!