Three Lakes Peak is just within the Flathead Indian Reservation along the Reservation Divide. The summit has great views of the Confederate Salish-Kootenai Tribes land, the Flathead River, three alpine lakes, the Mission Mountains and the Ninemile Valley. A Flathead Reservation Use Permit is required.
Vermilion Peak is accessed via a moderately climbing trail in the southern Cabinet Mountains. It also makes an easy SOTA double when teamed up with Mount Headley, W7M/LO-018. The summit has fine views of nearby summits and distant peaks, like the Cabinet Mountains Wilderness Area.
Mount Headley is easily accessed via a moderately climbing trail in the southern Cabinet Mountains. It also makes an easy SOTA double when teamed up with Vermilion Peak, W7M/LO-056. The summit is the tallest in the area and has fine views of nearby summits, lakes and distant peaks. Be sure to stop and view Graves Creek Falls w
Gifford Peak is a forested summit above Blue Lake in the Indian Heaven Wilderness. This area is a popular destination for day hikers and backpackers, directly on the Pacific Crest Trail, so be prepared to meet crowds any day with good weather. The lake can be approached from either Falls Creek Horse Camp or the Thomas Lake Trailhead. Once there, take Thomas Lake Trail to the northwest corner of the lake, and proceed up the ridge off-trail. The ridge is pronounced and easy to follow to the true summit.
Brundage Mountain SOTA brings the thought of riding a chair lift at the ski resort to the summit. In actuality, the true summit is a mile north of the ski resort are requires a bushwhack for most of the 4 mile round trip. The views from the summit mostly make up for bushwhack and somewhat dangerous final ascent to the summit.
Approach: Rough gravel road in from Hyak. Little parking and congested driving at hairpin curve ~1.7 miles before the trail head. Just past the hairpin curve the road is extremely steep, rocky and potholed, to the point only vehicles with good clearance can get through. (I have an Outlander PHEV that did fine going up, and scraped on one rock coming down.) Once at the trail head it was busy, but easy to find an open parking spot on a Sunday afternoon.
Big Mountain is part of Whitefish Ski Area and in the summer you can take the chairlift to the top ($20) and hike, ride bikes and activate Big Mountain. The communication towers that sit atop the summit are easy to see from the top of the chairlift and it's only a short quarter mile walk up the graded road to the top.
I went to Bend to visit my in-laws over the weekend and had time for one summit. Figured I would get my monies worth and go for a ten pointer I knew I could activate, Mount Bachelor.
I activated Mount Bachelor in 2018. For that activation I took the lift to the Pine Marten Lodge and hiked to the summit from there. I told myself the next time I activated this one I would start my hike from the bottom.
This summit is a progressively more difficult climb as you ascend. The activation is challenging but rewarding. The route I took starts with an easy well trafficked trail, but the second part of the ascent has no trail and involves navigating through the Angell Basin which consists of areas of large granite boulders.
We went up to Parker after activating Soda Mountain. This was a drive up summit, not sure if it always is, but the ODF lookout was being manned by a really nice guy Terry who welcomed us to the top to enjoy the view. Nice view of the surrounding summits in the Ashland/Klamath area. One of my favorite parts of going up to a new summit is viewing and identifying the different mountains I had activated or wish to. This lookout was a neat view of some of the near and far summits we have been to. Plenty of room to park and trees and rock to use to set up.