Good Parking At Trailhead

Horse Creek Butte doesn’t appear as classically defined buttes nor typical of buttes that characterize many Idaho and Montana landscapes.  It has a highly fractured ridge of boulders capping the summit, but with little geological relief from the surrounding subalpine fir, and lodgepole and whitebark pine forest. The summit route has good views of the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness Area, remote sections of the Salmon-Challis National Forest and large areas of burned forest.  

Cline Buttes is a moderate hike/ride, depending on your approach. The traditional mtb route is to start off the quarry road on the east side and climb the Cline Butte XC Trail around the west side interconnecting with FAA access road to the summit. There is a short cut near the summit that keeps you on the west side of the butte and drops you out right at several big rocks that are in the AZ and can provide some wind protection. 2M can work well but having had one failed activation for lack of 2M contacts, I highly suggest bringing and HF rig as well.

Baldy Peak was a wonderful and pleasant surprise. I recommend it. The minimum hike is 1.2 miles round trip with about 650’ vertical.  The hike can be extended by parking a bit further down B-1000 and hiking up the Buck Creek trail. 

I was fortunate enough to be first activator of this summit. I think it was never activated because people were trying to come at it from the Hwy 141 side. Even though there are seasonal access roads, approaching from the East side requires crossing private property. I approached the summit from the West side. 

 The route I took to 2700 – Circuit Peak was 3.6 miles round trip with 1100’ vertical.  It was a combination of forest road walking and moderate bushwhacking. I think it may take a few activators summiting to get the best route to the top identified. There are smaller ridgelines and drainages not shown on the topo maps, and it may be possible to follow the old roadbed nearly all the way to the summit.

This is an alternate summit route to what W6PZA wrote up here:  http://www.pnwsota.org/blog/w6pza/2020-november-30/summit-4420-or-november-2020 .  You can take the Cole Loop Trail 854 that crosses the road near the second gate on the road going up to Gray Butte. From the intersection of the road and Cole Loop Trail and back to that point is about 4.5 miles and 1500 vertical feet. 

The 5140 summit is a pleasant one mile hike from FR-2610 in the Ochoco National Forest. The turnoff to FR-2610 is right off of Hwy 26 and about 22 miles East of Prineville.  I activated in the winter on snow shoes, I found a road bed for the hike up that may allow a near drive up in the summer.

Bunsen Peak is an ancient volcanic cone characteristic of Yellowstone National Park. The peak is a very popular summit hike in Yellowstone Park near Mammoth Hot Springs. The trail is wide and even in October I found folks I could tag along with per the guidelines of not hiking alone in the Park. When I begin to lag, a young woman from Israel with her American boyfriend returned to check up on me and over my macho-objection she kept with me at my slow pace to the summit.  She also reminded me to not hike alone. Makes an old duffer feel quite good. 

Point 118 hosts a Missoula County communication site.  It is a rocky prominence with excellent views of the distant Selway- Bitterroot Wilderness’ rugged northern mountains.  Access is by foot or bicycle on a permanently gated road.  The summit is approximately 200 feet from this communication site. I experienced no RF interference or desense from the communications site at the summit.  There are various sized trees available for hanging antennas or attaching antenna poles.

Hike or Bike miles roundtrip:  4

Elevation gain: 475’

Turner Mountain in northwest Montana is approximately 22 miles north of Libby on Pipe Creek Road #567.  Turner ski area opened in 1961. It is currently active with a mile long double chairlift with 2100’ of vertical rise. The 1.8-mile vehicle access road is closed in the summer but open to mountain bikes and foot travel. I borrowed an ebike and rode to the summit via the reasonable grade ‘jeep road’.  The ride is 2.68 miles from the chair lift base to the summit, a rise of 1380’. Stops along the way were necessary to view the scenery, think ‘panting rest-stops’.

This was a NYE 'double' activation, and the 2023 part of it got me to 2000 activator points! You can read WW7D's report of our adventure in the January-February-March 2023 PNWSOTA Newsletter:

http://www.pnwsota.org/content/pacific-northwest-sota-newsletters