Blogs

This is a quick update on Grass Mountain, W7O/CC-002, near Alsea, OR. In the past, this trail to a grassy meadow with nice views of the valley below was worth the time and effort.

Powell Buttes HP is an RF intensive summit between Redmond and Prineville, OR. I believe that it is a VOR site in addition to the other typical radio equipment. It is clearly marked as off limits.

Give this one a pass.

On June 7, 2017 my wife and I were in the region east of Canyonville, OR. After enjoying Pickett Butte, we headed to Acker Rock, another rock outcrop with a lookout perched on top. Both of these are 2 point summits.

I was staying at The Lodge in Castle Rock State Park for a long weekend. This park is just north of City Of Rocks National Reserve which is a world class rock climbing destination. Though I am not a rock climber there are also a whole bunch of nice SOTA summits in the area. I picked CI-131 as I could see it from the front porch of The Lodge. In fact when I was on top, my wife, looking through binoculars, could see me waving at her. How often can your wife actually see you on a summit if she is not also with you?

This was the last of four Elkton, OR area summits that we explored on May 21, 2017. With a name like that, we were a bit apprehensive, but we set off along a route I traced on a topo map. It starts by turning off of Highway 38 onto Wetherly Creek Rd. This took us into an intense logging area, but no one was working on Sunday.

The third of four Elkton area summits that we went after was Bell Mountain, W7O/CC-061. We tried two routes. One was based on Google Maps directions, and the other was finding a route on the USGS topo map.

The second Elkton, OR area summit on our exploration list was Saddle Butte, W7O/CC-058.  The road to this summit starts near W7O/CC-80; but it looks considerably longer and more involved (I think it is called Little Tom Foley Rd). We headed out, and the road went through clearcuts and forests, but the dirt and gravel road quality was good.

Green Mountain, W7O/CM-109, is a two-point summit above the Calapooia River drainage in Oregon. It is 4505' asl and has a lookout tower on top. At least one hiking internet site said that it should be open to access by the public. I downloaded the Google Maps directions to it and headed off Thursday morning, May 18, 2017.