mt. washington starting from exit 38 state park. there are two ways to do this hike: a right way and a wrong way. i did both. the right way: follow the trail up through the trees. when you hit the first logging road (about 3300 ft), turn left. there are rocks blocking the route to the right (the wrong way, see below); the route to the left has cairns. from here there is a mess of many logging roads. at each junction, i followed the route with cairns and/or footprints and this was the correct, albeit circuitous, route. snow began around 3000 ft and was fairly consistent on the logging roads, but wasn't deep and there were enough melted-out spots that snowshoes were not worth the effort. the final bit of trail up to the summit was snow-free, as was the summit itself. on the way up, sun, rain, sun (gorgeous rainbow!), rain, snow, sun. there was only one set of footprints on this route and not that recent. where had the other people gone? answer: the wrong way. at the summit, i noticed many recent footprints leading down a much steeper, direct route. i decided to go down this way. bad choice. do you want to posthole in deep snow? do you want to slip on steep snow and scree? do you want to destroy the fragile hillside and new growth? and below the snow, there was a scary scramble down a wet, crumbly cliff, followed by some bushwhacking back to the logging road. why the hell have the majority of the people taken this way? it certainly didn't save any time, and the circuitous ridge has much nicer views. do it right, and don't add more misleading footprints to trick poor fools like me. 3 hrs up, 2 hrs 20 min down.