The Huckleberry Creek trail is long and lonely. It's one of the older trails in the park, shown on a 1919 map from back before Sunrise even existed, and one of the least visited.

Due to the length of this trail it is often done as a through-hike, either uphill to Sunrise (which is the elevation gain shown above) or downhill starting at Sunrise (my choice, only 600' elevation gain but still strenuous due to the 4100' descent). The nuisance of shuttling cars to both ends of the trail can be greatly reduced if a trail angel offers a lift from one to the other: thanks again Mary!

The lower trailhead lies along Forest Road 73, which as of 2022 was mildly potholed but no problem for my low clearance electric car. This end of the trail would make a great shoulder season forest hike. The gradient is mellow, while streams and giant trees abound. The trail covers a mile of National Forest land before entering the National Park near a disused patrol cabin.

At the upper end of the trail, Sunrise is a madhouse of people heading to Fremont Lookout or Burroughs Mountain, but a magical thing happens after hiking 0.85 miles west along Sourdough Ridge. Turn north onto the Huckleberry Creek trail, and, where did everyone else go? The trail climbs improbably toward what looks like a small peak along the ridge but is actually a way over it. In just a few hundred feet I went from a bazillion fellow hikers to zero. Silence. Complete solitude. Less than a mile from the Sunrise parking lot. This trail is great!

There are no Rainier summit views after you cross the top of Sourdough Ridge, but views to the north make up for that as you descend through a rocky glacial cirque into wildflower meadows and then the forested lower part of the trail.

A bit south of Forest Lake the trail went right over a giant tangle of pulverized trees, the terminus of an avalanche that came off the slopes to the west, flowed across the meadow below the trail, and left this mess when it ended here. It was easy enough to cross as of August 2022, but amazing and intimidating to see compacted ice from over a year earlier still mixed with and below the debris.