A couple years ago William, W6BIL, reached out to me through a local facebook hiking page because I had a bunch of free local hiking books to give away and he saw I was a ham. He too was a ham but had not been operating for years. We touched base and I found out he hiked Nugget Butte fairly regularly but was not a summiter. I got info from William on the legality of hiking, he never had an issue but I eventually gave Gold Hill a call. The woman I asked was unsure but called me back with a green light saying that the signage is for vehicular traffic due to their watershed, pedestrians are welcome to hike up and she said she heard it is beautiful and to enjoy my hike.
We parked a ways away from the "trailhead" at the Gold Hill library. The neighborhood in the area is a bit tight with no sidewalk, little shoulders so when you park on the side of the road it feels like you would be parking in peoples front yard. City Hall is closer to the TH if you want to park closer. The gate for the road up is at the dead end of Gustof Rd 42.43487, -123.05142. My tracking I think struggled with satellite in the beginning so it is not detailed to show this at the beginning of my tracks on sotamaps. About 2.5 mi up a dirt road with about 1600' gain. After we passed the water tank we took a grown over road with switchback to the left to avoid some steeper hiking. Some amazing views of the valley going up. An angle I have not had before on any summit.
We set up beside the road in a flat shaded area just below the summit. There was equipment traffic to stations so don't set up in road!! I ended up not going to the very top because of equipment and William said there was no view. This was W6BIL's first SOTA!
If doubtful of legalities just call City of Gold Hill a day in advance, but they had no problem when I called and I saved my recorded permission. de AG7GP
