Vineyard Mountain is 2 miles north of Corvallis, OR. Its an easy,
summit for beginners.
From Corvallis, travel north on OR-99W till reaching the "City
Limits Store" at Lewisburg (red light). Turn left onto Lewisburg Rd.
for 1.3 miles. Then, take the right side fork onto Sulfur Springs Rd.
Go another 1.3 mi up to Lewisburg Saddle. At the Saddle, there is
parking for maybe a dozen cars. It's a popular and crowded place.
Go slow near there.
From the trailhead at the Saddle, head NNW on Nettleton Rd. #500.
Take the upper gravel road, not the lower one. After about 1.5 miles,
you reach an intersection of several roads. Go straight towards the
gates that are visible. This will put you onto a narrow paved road.(!)
Turn left going 0.1mi up an insanely steep grade to the tower farm.
The careful map reader may notice that you could nearly drive to the
summit. With such a nice hike, why would you drive? Vineyard mountain
trail is another possibly more scenic way up. Also, note that the
SOTA summit is not what other maps maps call "Vineyard Mountain".
The tower farm is off limits as well as the closest house. Just before
the gate at the top, there is a small clearing with some slash piles to
the right. This is within the AZ. I operated there. The clearing has
some large fir and white oak surrounding it. There were also a few small
firs. I fastened my SOTA pole to one of them.
Only had 7 contacts on 20M. However, I got enjoy watching two does who
kept circling me wondering what I was up to. After a while we both got
tired of each other and headed home.
