Beautiful day for a nearby hike! We misunderstood and took the trail directly behind the restroom, even though it connects to the main path, I would not recommend (a lot of brush, down trees, spiky vines and slippery steps).

We only saw a handful of people all day, parking lot was less than half full at 11 AM. There are a couple of water crossings/where the water was running down the trail but nothing too bad, recommend waterproof shoes though. There were barely any icy patches towards the top so very manageable without microspikes, it has been surprisingly dry lately.

Were greeted by a pika and a douglas squirrel on our way up and annoyed by gray jays at the top; please don't feed them. Great views of Mt Rainier and Mt Baker!

Mount Washington is a really wet hike right now. Starting at the first main creek crossing there are numerous places where the trail is covered with running water - more so than usual. There are numerous tricky water crossings, especially after the first talus field.

The upper half of the trail beyond the pond/marsh has snow cover, but given how warm it was today, it's pretty much all deep, wet slush. Most of the trees on the upper trail were also shedding snow. Since a lot of the snow is melting, the good news is that you can get all the way up without spikes, but waterproof boots and poles would be your friend.

The lower half of the trail has about a dozen significant blowdowns. Some of them are pretty brushy. The largest ones are about a foot thick. None of them are too hard to get around.

There were very few people on the trail. I ran into five people total (only two of whom went all the way up).

Cool misty fall hike on Saturday the 22nd. The trail is in great shape all the way to the summit with a few small and easily managed blowdowns (only one that requires briefly leaving the trail). Good conditioning hike!

What's new: mushrooms are popping up and the fall foliage is starting to show.

What's the same: The trail signage is poor. The parking lot and trail had plenty of space even though it was a sunny weekend day. Most of the hike is a steady climb through healthy forest. The views don't come until near the summit. A few sections of trail are overgrown. This is most significant after a rain or a heavy dew overnight. (I wish I had brought a cutlass.) Long sections of the trail are very rocky. Like most of the hikes leading away from I-90, there is the hum of highway noise for the first couple of miles.

We knew we were going to start "late" (at least for us) due to an event the previous evening, so we decided to do a trail that is less traveled.

Started at the Ollalie State Park near Hall Creek and headed up the trail to Palouse before joining up with Change Creek. This trail is considered "not maintained," but it is in reasonable shape. The first mile is really steep as you follow switchbacks up the mountain. Once you hit Hall Point, the trail flattens out a bit, BUT it also gets really brushy. So if you come wearing shorts, you will leave scratched and bleeding.

After about another mile of walking through devil's club, berry bushes, and random other thorny plants, you will end up on NF-350, where you can take this to the short unmarked trail to Change Peak. 

After a short break at the summit headed back down. Decided to hide from the sun and go the "back way" back with hopes for a more shaded path and less brush. 

We turned off NF-350, where it makes a hard turn and connects with the "Great Wall" trail (per Gaia, but unnamed on many other maps) to connect to the Mt Washington trail. This route was WAY less brushy, and we were able to move quickly.

Made it back to the Palouse trail and then took the Deception Crags trail back to the Ollalie State park.

Overall: 11.19 miles, 3,356 ft vertical, 4:48:50 total time including breaks and too many scratches to count.