Hiking time: 8 hours, 17 minutes, 42 seconds. I can't remember when a hike wore me out more than this one did. It's hours since I got back and I'm still absolutely beat! I can't imagine myself ever doing this hike again. On the other hand, maybe my biorhythms were just out of sync. The Balsamroot Sunflower show was peaking. Spectacular flower show, beyond belief. The trails were crawling with people. Never saw a killer hike so crowded during the week. The word was obviously out about this most spectacular display of Balsamroot in the world. It appeared three weeks earlier than normal, due to anthropogenic global warming.

Got on the trail at 6:40 o'clock AM. Trail starts at an elevation of 100 feet. Milestones:

1. 0:42:24.16 o'clock (42 minutes and 24.16 seconds into the hike). After 1/2 mile and climbing to an elevation of 780 feet, the trail splits off to the original, less scenic, and steeper trail on the left which is 2.2 miles to the summit, and to the more recently built, more scenic and not quite a steep trail on the right which is 2.6 miles to the summit. I took the more scenic trail to the right.

2. 1:43:54 o'clock (1 hour, 1 minute, and 30 seconds later). After 1 mile from the previous milestone and climbing to an elevation of 1,600 feet, the trail emerged out of the trees to provide wide sweeping views of the Columbia Gorge and distant views towards the yellow Balsamroot-blanketed upper slopes of Dog Mountain.

3. 1:52:11 o'clock (8 minutes and 17.14 seconds later). After taking in the views and resting, resumed hiking.

4. 2:20:27 o'clock (28 minutes and 16.49 seconds later). After 1/2 mile and a climb to an elevation of 1,960 feet, the original trail and the the more recently built trail merge to form the last, extremely steep leg to the summit.

5. 4:06:12 o'clock (1 hour, 45 minutes, and 44 seconds later). After climbing another mile to an elevation of 2,920 feet, reached the summit, where there were dozens of people standing and sitting around taking in the view.

6. 4:43:50 o'clock (37 minutes and 38.16 seconds later). Resumed hiking back after resting and eating lunch. I gave up the idea of retracing my steps down the Dog Mountain Trail because I judged it was just too steep. I just wasn't up to it this day. Instead I took the Connector Trail to the intersection of the Augspurger Trail.

7. 5:57:24 o'clock (1 hour, 13 minutes, and 34 seconds later). Arrived at the intersection of Augspurger Trail, a distance of 1.2 miles and a descent to an elevation of 2,200 feet, where I rested and ate.

8. 6:16:20 o'clock (18 minutes and 56.24 seconds later). Resumed hiking.

9. 8:17:42 o'clock (2 hours, 1 minute, and 22 seconds later). Arrived back at the car. During this last leg, I took one more rest stop of about 10 minutes, then crawled back to the car.When I got back to the supermarket-sized parking lot, it was jam packed with cars, many of which had to park illegally on the highway shoulder because all the legal spots were full. I utterly was dead on my feet, with pain in my toes. The pain subsided by bedtime and there was no damage to anything.

Took 174 photos, of which 97 made the cut.