13 miles round-trip in 7.5 hours with about 30 minutes at the summit. Although it was the day after the hottest day of the year, it started out a bit cooler - but not cool enough. It started out cloudy, but warm, until just before we reached the summit. Then the sun came out and it really got warm. The hike starts out at a gradual uphill slog but gets increasingly steeper as you go. There are a couple of small waterfalls just past the rock quarry (I seem to remember reading about a Sunshine Falls somewhere) but the water levels are probably a lot lower now than other times of the year. Started seeing piles of bear scat at about 4600 feet but it seemed to be a week old, or possibly older - never did see or hear any bears. The summit meadow was pretty awesome - wildflowers everywhere and spectacular views (especially across the Middle Fork valley). The true summit is a little bit of a bushwhack (about 130 feet past the end of the road/trail) but affords a view of Bessemer Mountain which is about another mile of bushwhacking away. South Bessemer was enough of a workout for me though, so after lunch we headed back down for an uneventful descent.