Pretty difficult but absolutely beautiful!
We did the loop clockwise and camped at Deadmans Lake which was gorgeous and very comfortable -- maybe one of my favorite places I've camped. The water is clear and surprisingly warm, definitely suitable for wading or swimming, with lots of fish and salamanders. The wildflowers were also spectacular on this whole loop. There will probably be a ton of berries on this trail later in the summer, too, judging by the number of berry bushes. Bugs weren't too bad (a few clouds of gnats but nothing aggressive, and there were some mosquitos at the lake but once we lit a campfire the smoke got rid of them entirely). Weather was pretty much perfect. I'd say this was an ideal time of year to do this hike. There is one great view of Mt. Saint Helens, several views of Mt. Rainier, and one spot where you can see both Rainier and Adams.
Now for a couple of warnings. First, you are definitely going to get wet on a couple of the creek crossings. There is one crossing on the first day where your only option is to ford it, and another one just before that where the rocks you step on are so slippery that you might be better off fording it, especially with a heavy pack. The water itself isn't too treacherous, it's just a little annoying. There are also a LOT of downed trees. Like, more downed trees than I have ever seen on a single hike in my entire life, mainly on the first day. It got to the point that any time we lost the trail, we could reliably find it again by looking for a downed tree. It was like there is some kind of cosmic rule on this trail that if a tree falls, it will magically fall directly over the trail.
If we were going to do this hike again we'd split the first day (the 11.5 miles from the base to Deadmans Lake) into two days, since the climbing on that first day left us pretty wiped out and made the second half of that day more miserable than it needed to be. There's a lake near the top of Tumwater Mountain, right after you finish the worst of the climbing, that we later regretted not camping at. Overall though, I'd definitely recommend this hike -- it's a tough one but well worth it!
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