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Peak(s)  Huron Peak  -  14,006 feet
Browns Peak  -  13,526 feet
Date Posted  06/18/2025
Date Climbed   07/07/2023
Author  rob runkle
 Huron and Brown Peaks with the Kids (Lulu Gulch TH)   

Huron is a pretty easy hike, if you can get to the 4WD trailhead, and that is what I "planned" to do. We had camped at a Buena Vista Campground (BV Overlook Camp & Lodging) for the night. So, we got up early, to drive to the trailhead. It took us about an hour to drive to the Winfield Trailhead. I kept driving, planning to get to the 4WD trailhead. I went about another 0.7 mile and found what I thought was the 4WD trailhead. We parked, packed up our gear and headed out (7 am), up the obvious trail on the left (uphill, a gate, and clear switchbacks). Just to give away the "punchline" to this story early, we started at the Lulu Gulch Trailhead, about 1.4 miles short of the Lake Ann Trailhead (upper 4WD trailhead). It took us quite a while to figure out our mistake, but we made lemonade out of lemons anyway.

Since we started at Lulu Gulch, this Report will document how we ascended Browns Peak from Lulu Gulch, then over to Huron and back down the main route. The trail starts with a bunch of switchbacks, but the trail is very clear, and very wide. It was clearly an old mining road. At about a mile into the hike, there was a clear turn off to the left. This would be the correct Lulu Gulch route listed on 14ers.com. We were too cool for that route. Nope, we made another mistake. I swear that I remember a sign at this turn saying "restoration area." So, we passed this turn, and continued straight. The trail straight was also a very clear trail, as it was definitely and old mining road. At about 2 miles, we hit the last of some switchbacks, then the trail seemed to just end. By this point, we had figured out that we we started on the wrong trailhead, and missed that turn off. We determined that we were located on the lower slopes, below the ridge to Browns Peak. On any previous year, I would have probably gotten a mutiny from the kids. But, this year they were in great shape, and honestly much stronger than I was. We knew we were off route, but we also knew that we could recover, gain Browns Peak, then hike easily over to Huron.

So, we decided to go off-trail and hike up the slopes to the west ridge of Browns. The slopes were crazy steep, but had vegetation, so it wasn't too loose. Nolan (14 yo, cross country and track runner) was leading the way, and leaving me in the dust. Anna (16 yo, competition and and sideline cheerleader) was staying at about my pace, but she seemed to be having a better time at it than I was. The west slopes hike was slow and grueling, but eventually we made it to the ridge and got a good view of Browns and Huron Peak. Once we gained the ridge, it was a mild class 2 hike to the summit of Browns Peak. We arrived at the summit of Browns Peak in 3:45 from the trailhead (3 mi). We stayed on Browns for about 10 minutes. The hike over to Hurons Peak was an easy class 2. We arrived at the Huron summit around 5:00 (3.75 m) from the trailhead.

We spent almost 40 minutes on the summit of Huron. From the summit, I was able to get cell service, so that I could download GPS maps and determine the route we took. Overall, our minor mistakes led to a harder hike, but nothing dangerous and we always had multiple ways to recover, if we needed to. We took the standard route for our decent off Huron. Our descent took 8:24 total round trip, 2:44 from the summit (8.81 miles roundtrip, ~3800 ft).

Anna and Nolan will always remember that hike; the planned easy hike that turned into a difficult hike, but one which they both conquered!


My GPS Tracks on Google Maps (made from a .GPX file upload):




Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):
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