Rain:
It was 60% showers in the forecast today, and we got showers 60% of the time, all the time. If you're willing to accept that you may have no views, I thought both of these hikes at least kept decent footing and drained well. There is a degree of exposure especially on Silver, so mind your feet even on a nice day!
Spur Trail?:
I had intended to check out the spur trail named "Silver Peak Trail" on a number of trail maps at (47.35989° N, 121.45213° W). It is, as it turns out, at the magical 1.7mi mark, but from the Mount Catherine trailhead. Definite possibility for confusion there, especially with all of the reports around how easy the turnout is to miss. Well, I can say with some certainty that no such spur trail exists. If you want the real Silver Peak Trail as it is described in the WTA entry, your cutoff is at (47.35396° N, 121.45455° W) and although there is no flashing neon light, it can be clearly found by anyone looking for it.
Silver Peak:
Not much to comment about the PCT. It is a known quantity and serves its purpose well to get you to your junction. There is one point maybe half way up the Silver Peak Trail where you encounter a rock face. There appears to be a path heading left around it, but I would actually encourage you to take the wall straight on as the mud on the bypass will get slippery. The holds are good even in full rain, and you'll want to warm your hands up for the latter portion of the trail anyway.
The scramble appears daunting at first, and I won't deny that it's steep, but the path is pretty clearly laid out, and the loose rock holds its shape reasonable well. After the initial climb up shale, there's a brief respite followed by a few hundred feet of 3-4 limb scramblung. At least the rock here is mostly solid, and if you're lucky, you may even encounter a Pika.
I was surprised to see some persevering heather and a couple other wildflowers in the final scramble. Although edible berry season has come to a close here, berry plant fall colors were on display. The winner of the fall color show, however, was the perennial champion of PNW fall colors: unrelenting grayness.
Mount Catherine:
This is an excellent burnout hike, or potentially (although I haven't tried this) a sort of hike where you could watch the sun set from the summit and make it down before dark (god have mercy on your suspension navigating the potholes in darkness though). The views are probably good, probably not as good as they probably are at Silver Peak, but mine wouldn't be the right trip report for that.
Road:
It's really not all that bad for any attentive driver until the last quarter mile before Windy Pass with the notable exception of one washout just before the Catherine trailhead. You'd have to really dislike your car to put it through that gauntlet of rocks to Windy Pass instead of pulling off to the side of the road and just doing an extra 5 minute warm up walk. In fact, I'd recommend doing that anyway to split the distance between Silver and Catherine so you can pair up the hikes. Anecdotally, the outbound side of the road seemed to have fewer washboards, potholes and other obstacles with the (again notable) exception of the one washout. I still think any car could carefully navigate the washout, but it's a matter of approach angle as much as it is overall clearance. The longer your front/rear end hangs past your wheelbase, the more likely you are to scrape it.
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