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Goat Mountain, WA | July 2020

WJ7WJ's picture
Summit: 
W7W/LC-035
Voice Cellular Coverage: 
Don't know
Data Cellular Coverage: 
Spotty, may not work at all
Cellular Provider: 
Verizon
APRS Coverage: 
Good digi echos

Quick search of sota summits finds 30 Goat Mountains, exclusive of my favorites: Old Goat Mountain and Scape Goat Mountain. Can unfortunately relate to both of those.

There are six in W7W and 2 in W7W/LC. This blog is about W7W/LC-035. The plan for this trip was found on summitpost: https://www.summitpost.org/goat-mountain/153737. Andrew, K7AHR, and I followed those directions to a successful activation.

However, I would suggest that the road has become much worse, the legendary pot holes are now epic. The road is not fit for a Honda Fit. Andrew made a valiant effort at social distancing in his car, but eventually it was windows down masks on and one F150 bouncing its way up. Note that the road gets progressively worse and it is perfectly feasible to drive as far as you can and start hiking or biking from there. No biking from the “trailhead” up as it is way too steep and there are way too many obstacles. The trail is more defined than I anticipated and we were able to follow it most of the way up and there was but minor deviation from that track on the way down. Good idea to set way points at the summit and at the “trailhead”.

Directions:

Turn off 503 at 46.042059, -122.310391 onto NF-81

Turn off 81 at 46.1402, -122.3296 onto NF-030

Turn off NF030 at NF-470

Trailhead = 46.1604, -122.3119

From there follow your GPS for 1600 vertical feet in just less than a mile. There is a closer peak and the trail leads to the saddle in between. So some contouring there and then back to up, up, up.