Blogs

I've spent many wonderful fall weekends black powder hunting near Suttle Lake west of Sisters, Oregon.
I've hunted the slopes of Cache Mountain as well, so activating Cache Mountain has long been on my mind.
The B&B complex fire of 2003 devastated the area and the game in the area seems non-existent. Still,
I couldn't wait to go back, this time with smaller caliber hunting gear.

The access to Cache Mountain is via US Hwy 20. The turn off onto Old Santiam Wagon Road, FS 2067,

A short Hike and Activation in the San Gabriel Mountains of Southern California.  2+/- Miles round trip with 750 feet elevation Gain.  Summit Elevation is 7,515, and the views are nice.  This Activation is often done together with Waterman Mountain, W6/CT-012, which was the case for us.

Wonderful hike for a sunny, breezy day! Quite chilly on the summit with the gusty winds. No trees or rock formations to take shelter under.  I spent 2.5 hours on the summit and had constant radio traffic! I had planned on working 2M and 70cm, but had so much traffic on 2M, I couldn't find time to check out 70cm - so my appologies to those who listened for me on 70cm.

From the summit, there are incredible views of Puget Sound, including the entire Seattle area, and up into Vancouver Island and Canada.

A Gem of a Hike and Activation in the San Gabriel Mountains of Southern California.  6+ Miles round trip with 1,200 feet elevation Gain.  Summit Elevation is 8,038, and the views are fantastic! 

In recent years, our family has transitioned from tradition material gift giving
to giving that is more relationally based. My oldest son Andrew had noticed that
I kept talking about activating Hayrick Butte but was a bit reluctant based on
the looks of it from the map and in person. He took notice and did a bit of
research. On Christmas morning 2014 I got an interesting relational gift of a
winter-time summit attempt and activation of Hayrick Butte.

Hayrick Butte is an interesting geological feature. Hayrick Butte is a tuya

I was off work today and all the kids were at school. I had a doctor's appointment at 0915 and did not have anything else planned for the remainder of the day. I decided that I would head down and recon this unnamed summit in the South side of Capital Forest. Capital Forest has a handful of one and two pointers and this is the last one that I had not activated. Capital Forest is a State Forest that has opportunities for everyone; horseback riders, off road ATVers, hikers, bikers etc.

Quck activation of my "Neigborhood SOTA Summit".  It takes me less than 10 minutes to arrive at TH from home. On a very warm day for nearly the end of January (60+ degrees F), we set out from Anti Aircraft TH, Cougar Mountain Regional Park.  Our route was abot 7 miles circuit of the upper reaches of the Park.  Wilderness Peak is about 1,600 foot in elevation and a 1 point SOTA summit.

I moved to Central Oregon from Western Colorado last month. I got into SOTA in Colorado and decided to to dust off my radio and see the hills in Oregon.

I chose Juniper Butte because it is close to my home and close to Haystack Butte. I was going to try for a double.

The day after Christmas seemed like a good day to do some local re-con on a two-pointer I've been
meaning to try out. I left the house about 11:30am headed for Bald Mountain W7O/CC-011 in Polk
county Oregon and packed the backpack with radio and SOTA pole just in case I got lucky.

To get to Bald Mountain, you need to get on OR 223, also known as Kings Valley HWY. OR 223 can be
accessed from US Hwy 20, west of Corvallis, OR or near the junction of OR 22 and OR 99W close to
Dallas, Oregon. The first off-pavement turn from OR 223 is on Valstez Rd about 0.4 miles east of

A fun evening activation. Here is the blog to the activation: http://kf7pxt.blogspot.com/2014/12/w7wso-081-sota-activation-and-other.html