This was my second trip up Buroughs, it was a great day to be on Mount Rainier! We started out early we were there shortly after sunrise. We headed up the trail past Frozen lake hit a little snow up the first hill. It won't be there much longer, goats peeked over the hill as us. The trail was pretty easy all the way up, incline is tough but snow was not an issue. We saw goats down in the valley to the right of the top of Burroughs so we had to go down the trail towards Burroughs 3, in the lower valley we went down a snow field,made for quiet an adventure. We realized we were not getting back up that snow field. So we headed towards skyscraper pass. Had to go down more snow fields. Ended up turning around and having to climb up a hill, once we saw the trail again we stopped in the field for lunch. Julie a great ranger came to check on us, she made sure we were ok, since we were off course. Moral to the story don't cross the snow fields off trail, we ended up going back up Burroughs to head out down sourdough ridge. We ended up going like 16 miles, it was a long day, but an awesome adventure! Oh yeah there was a bear about half a mile from the parking lot on the way out, no chance to get a pic through the trees. I love my mountain! The goats on Sunrise are awesome, I know lots of people talk about the aggressive goats in the Olympics, Sunrise goats are not aggressive, at least the many times I have seen them I have never seen or heard of them having any issues.

Did a quick day hike up near Sunrise. Instead of starting at the Sunrise parking lot we started at Sunrise Point. This added an extra 5 miles over Sourdough Ridge which made our total distance covered 14 miles. We drove up from the West side of Rainier on a cloudy day and were rewarded with sunny skies on the Eastern section. This is a relatively easy hike with the only potential problem areas being some steep snow covered slopes near Burroughs Mountain. Not recommended for children. Burroughs Mountain offers great views of Rainier and is a somewhat desolate, rock covered area. Many chipmunks and wildflowers.

We really couldn't have picked a finer day to hike the loop trail. We started from the North side of the Visitors Center up to Sourdough Ridge and Frozen Lake, then to First and Second Burroughs. Be very cautious along the way from Frozen Lake to First Burroughs, there were 5 snow fields along the side of the hill that we crossed that were very slick so use caution here. We then headed back to the Visitor Center via the Burroughs Mt Trail. All in all it was a spectacular day and we ended up seeing quite a few wildflowers and Mountain Goats along the way.

I love Sunrise, this was my 3rd trip In the last few months. Never a disappointment, saw a bear on the road in, goats were having a great time on the trail to Fremont lookout. I waited about 30 mins for them to move off the trail so I could go through, of coarse I took about 300 pics while I waited. It was a great day using my new camera. Do yourself a favor go up early!

an exploratory loop up sourdough ridge past a not frozen lake - to fremont lookout - and down and up to burroughs and back via sunrise rim with a peek at shadow lake although there were no relatives to be seen - most likely hiding from the drying effects of the sun - i did spot many other creatures from goats to chippies to a marmot to deer and all day long the mountain there in view...making me feel even smaller than my usual stature