Mount Washington — Sunday, Jan. 14, 2007

Snoqualmie Region > North Bend Area

Leaving the Eastside at 6:45, my buddy and I were at the TH by 7:30 and on the trail 10 minutes later. After a short period on the 'ol Iron Horse Trail, we started up the road-trail. Not as bad as Dirty Harry's... but still pretty bad. After an hour of horribly monotonous traversing, we reached the ""Owl Hike Spot"", where it was time for a bit of food. Dawning snowshoes (although more to save our backs than out of necessity), we continued, following the fork in trail towards the Washington Creek access. Washington Creek is really beautiful, but not enough to get cold to take the camera out. After some more tiresome efforts, especially considering my Camelbak had frozen and I was restricted to my 1L nalgene, we reached the base of the North Ridge at 10:00. Here I snapped some pictures, and due to the battery power of the camera the only pictures of the hike. After a short break, we started up the ridge... This was by far the best part of the hike! Quite steep, and in a few places I considered getting out my ice axe, but for the most part it was fairly packed down by former hikers. We'd take a short break every 200 vertical feet or so to soak in the views from the 2nd or 3rd growth tree ridge. Near the end, it makes a tight squeeze through some trees, and after exiting the trees is 50 or so degrees. This was pretty sketchy, but only 20 vertical feet or so. Afterwards, hike south on the unmarked forest road and back Northwest to gain the summit. Time was 11:00. After leaving the summit at 11:15, we decided to take the conventional, 6-mile route down. Believe me, the slog along the ridge separating Washington and Change Creeks lasts forever. For good reason too, as it is about 1.5 miles. Grade was just enough downhill sloping so that the slight sidehilling hurt the ankles unbearably. Saw 2 others shortly after leaving the ridge, and continued down. We reached the car 10 minutes short of 3 hours from leaving the summit.