Dock Butte has great views of it's Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest home. There is plenty of antenna room on the summit and it's only a short 3-mile roundtrip hike. The trail is great - a bit steep and requires just a very short scramble near the top. It took us about an hour from the trailhead.
Our trip began with a 2-hour drive that got us on the trail by about 7:30 AM. We had travelled East from Burlington, WA on SR20 to MP 82 where we turned left on the Baker Lake Highway. 12 miles later we turned left again on Forest Service Road #12 and travelled another 11 miles following the signs to the Blue Lake Trailhead.
The air was quite cool, the dust was down, and the blue huckleberries ripe. At about .2 miles up the trail, we stayed right at a Y to continue towards the Butte instead of the lake. The last push to the summit is the steepest part - the trail divides with one path that obviously pushes straight up the ridge to the top. We went to the right on a trail which gains elevation with a few switchbacks before returning to the same ridge just below the summit.
The activation went well with 8 40M QSO's, 18 more on 20M, and 4 text messages from jealous friends and family. We always have better luck when I post an alert and arrive on time!
It's bear season, but thankfully we saw no hunters. In fact we didn't see anyone on this heavily used trail until we headed back down around 10:30.
.JPG "Dock Butte")
.JPG "Pretty steep along the ridge route")
.JPG "Room at the top, and handy trees")
.JPG "Scenic views all the way around")
.JPG "Selfie")
.JPG "Mount Baker is awsome")