The trick to finding the Sunlight Lake trail is to find a way to ford Vallecito Creek. Be sure and read the Rock Creek to Sunlight Crossing Approach for more detail. We have succeeded twice at a location about 150 - 200 yards down from where on the USGS map, Vallecito Creek has split and then come back together and then levels and spreads out a little. Try these coordinates which were field verified in 2018. N 37° 37' 52.1" W 107° 32' 21.7". There will be a good trail on the other side if you're in the right location. Wade on across in water that may reach mid to upper thighs and can be fairly swift, earlier in the season. Once across, leave your boots off or on loosely and head upstream on the trail and cross to the NORTH side of Sunlight Creek. You'll probably have to wade this one as well. It's best to just go ahead and cross right where the trail meets Sunlight Creek. We've never found a better location by looking upstream on three separate trips.
Once across Sunlight Creek, the trail begins the arduous journey up the Sunlight drainage. The incredible beauty and remoteness of the upper Sunlight Basin will compensate for the difficulty in getting there, or at least keep telling yourself that as you struggle up. The 2,500 feet in elevation gain will be one of the most difficult you'll encounter in the central Weminuche. WARNING: Do not be misled by either G&M or Rosenbrough's book (if you still have them), that the trail is on the south side of Sunlight Creek. Both are wrong. After crossing to the north side of Sunlight Creek, the trail heads up an embankment, swings to the left, climbs a little more and comes to a more level location in the forest. Watch for the Sunlight trail heading off to your left, marked by a couple of cairns. The trail you're on will continue north heading toward Leviathan Creek. Make sure you do not miss the Sunlight trail and go too far north toward Leviathan Creek. This critical turn will be less than 5 minutes from crossing Sunlight Creek.
As you head up the trail, you will cross numerous fallen logs. Then there is a brief section where it follows closely alongside the creek. We last visited this trail the summer immediately following substantial winter avalanches in 2005. Getting through this lower section was an incredible pain. From our 2018 visit up this trail the unmaintained Sunlight trail has been somewhat re-established through here. Most of the tree-crossing problem has been eliminated. New growth has come back in. The trail is still difficult to follow. Someone has marked it at many locations with small cairns but it’s still easy to lose. If you do lose it, be aware that the trail does pull away from the creek to the north some at two locations in order to gain elevation at steeper sections of the valley. Once out of the smaller aspen re-growth, the trial moves more into conifers and becomes easier to follow. The trail then crosses to the south side of Sunlight Creek at about 10,800 ft. There use to be a nice log here to get you across, but that log has been swept to one side. You will likely have to wade again. This is a critical crossing to make if you want to stay on the trail. It occurs where the valley constricts and leaves little choice as to where to go. The trail takes you right to this crossing. The following coordinates for this crossing were field-verified in 2018. (N 37° 37' 54.5" W 107° 33' 41.5")
The trail then stays on the south side of the creek for about the next 3/4 mile. Immediately after crossing to the south side of the creek, the trail wades through lush, tall undergrowth, heading west. It then climbs up onto a bench well above the creek, levels out and eventually comes back close to creek level. After that, where a major tributary comes in from the south, the trail almost gets lost in willows and undergrowth and crosses multiple stream channels. If you lose it here, head generally to the west, to a more open but vegetated slope that climbs steeply. You should be able to re-find the trail heading up through here. It is fairly well-defined and switchbacks up the steep, open, but heavily vegetated slope and swinging away from the creek to the south and west some. Then the trail heads NW to round a side of the mountain, passing by some tall dead trees and drops you back to the creek heading more westerly and crossing to the north side again around a willowy area where things have again flattened out and the stream meanders some. The trail may be difficult to spot in the willows. Just beyond this crossing, you'll be in what were the last good trees before the trail ascends to Sunlight Lake. (They’re all dead now.) There's two small campsites here. They use to be larger but lush vegetation has taken over much of what use to accommodate up to four tents easily. If you're not entirely beat up yet, continue another .6 mile on to the lake where some more open sites exist. The trail up to the lake does not follow the main watercourse, but rather, a secondary drainage. If you made it this far, congratulations! On the way on up to the lake, just as the trail begins to make a turn to the SW and cross a small stream, there is a trail that will take you into the basin north of Jagged Mtn. Field-verified coordinates for where this trail turns off are: N 37° 38' 19.4" W 107° 34' 44.8". You will likely have to hike uphill a little to locate this trail. It cannot be seen from below on the Sunlight Lake trail.
The following 13ers may be accessed as "day hikes" from the tree camp or a campsite by Sunlight Lake: McCauley Peak, Grizzly Peak, Greylock Mountain, possibly Jupiter Mtn., UN13,121, Peak Eleven, Knife Point, Peak Ten, Jagged Mtn., Leviathan Peak and Vallecito. Quite a spectacular and varied collection!