The road up the to the trailhead should be good for all vehicles except for past the third gate. It's rough, but if you go slow, it should be ok. 

I was able to drive all the way up to the lookout.

The tower had volunteers, so it was open.

There are plans to make it fully ADA accessible.  

The lookout is currently staffed which meant I was able to drive up to the top. The project to make the lookout ADA accessible is progressing well and the new decking around the lookout is really nice. There was a newly reported fire visible, even though Rainier was hiding behind clouds. The volunteer staffing the lookout was really awesome to talk to. 

I did the long route from Buck Creek, following Trail 1183.  I haven't seen any recent reports on this way, so I thought I'd throw this up there.  The description says it's 16.6 miles and 2,800 feet of gain.  I did add the side trail to Doe Falls, which adds about a mile.  While the elevation numbers might initially look like 2,800 feet because you start around 2500 and end around 5400, there's enough up and down, that it's closer to 5,000 feet of cumulative gain.

As I started hiking, I was noticing that all the tracks appeared to be dirt bike tracks, and no footprints.  Sure enough, I didn't run into any other hikers and did meet about 10 folks on dirt bikes.  So this trail doesn't appear to be big for hikers, but more of a dirt bike trail.  It wasn't a problem, I could hear them coming and easily get out of their way, and they were all super polite, thanking me and letting me know how many were in their group, etc.

As far as the trail goes, I can kind of see why it's not a huge hiking trail.  For as much effort you put into 17 miles and 5,000 feet, there wasn't a whole lot of really cool stuff.  It's a nice forest trail and all, but there are only a couple good spots for views and of course the final destination you can literally drive right up to.  But I've wanted to try it out and now I've done it, but it won't make my list of favorites.

Unfortunately Doe Falls was Doe Dries, not even a trickle.  Pretty much all the other creeks were dried up as well - there was one small one about 3/4 mile in, but that was it.  Fortunately, I had enough water with me, so that wasn't a problem.

There were some really cool mushrooms along the way and a bit of Indian Paintbrush along with a few other flowers I don't know the names of.

Sadly, today was also way more smokey than I anticipated.  I knew there was a warning, but I didn't think it would get quite that bad.  It started off fine, but just as I crossed Buck Creek, I could really start to smell it.  A short time later, my throat actually started hurting a bit, so I dug out one of my old Covid N95 masks and threw it on.  That actually helped.  I'll show one of the lookouts both on the way up and the way down and you can see how quickly things got smoked out.

All said, I'm glad I did it, smoke and all.

Suntop lookout was a great place to visit in mid August.  Excellent sunset and clear skies for the Milky Way.  The main forest service road was in good condition.  A few pothole and 4-wheel drive recommended but not required.  The last 1/2 mile past the gate was in terrible condition with huge potholes and tricky navigation, would not recommend going up to the top without a high clearance 4-wheel drive vehicle.  There is plenty of parking prior to the gate and an steep but easy 1/2 mile hike from the parking area to the lookout tower.

Forgot to write this TR. Written Sept 10th. "Hiked" Aug 13th.

Hiked in quotations because I actually only drove up here after overnighting in the Norse Peak Wilderness.

Road up isn't too bad, esp if you have AWD or 4x4. Some exposed rocks that could puncture worn out or low-ply tires though. Single lane road with high exposure on one side so just drive carefully. Probably space for 6 cars in the lot.

Really crowded up here today as the guy manning the lookout had his family visiting. They had a telescope set up pointing towards the mountain which was cool! Really friendly guy up there and talked to him a bit about how to volunteer to station a fire lookout, had no idea you could do that!

Sweet looking toward Kelly Butte lookout where I had been about 1.5 months earlier.