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Blue Mountains: Misery Peak W7W/WE-003 & Garfield County H.P. W7W/WE-002
This is a bit of a scouting mission as I’d only been to the Blue Mountains a couple of times and those were the pre-summit hunting days. Two relatively easy looking targets: Mount Misery W7W/WE-003 and the Garfield County High Point W7W/WE-002. Happy to report that the Umatilla National Forest roads were surprisingly wide a…
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Idaho FA: Grandmother Mtn W7I/NI-085 (and Mark’s Butte W7I/NI-092)
A couple of Northern Idaho’s smallish summits that, in an earlier spring attempt were blocked by snow, are a bit of a long forest road drive to access. As you start to climb above 5300ft, FR301 becomes more rough than a standard SUV can handle. I parked my Honda at 47.01588, -116.06868 and walked the…
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Traverse Ridge W7O/NE-017
A tough week resulted in the hasty decision to head into the Wallowas of Eastern Oregon. We arrived at the Hurricane Creek Campground just before sunset on a Thursday evening to set up camp and crawl into the tent. Up early Friday we made our way to the “trailhead” along Lime Quarry Rd 45.37808, -117.35148…
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A Week in Switzerland
In July made a quick escape to see some mountains of a different variety. Much time was spent hiking, train hopping, walking the streets and looking up, mouth agape. Just incredible beauty in this land. A little bit of time was spent in Zurich and Lucerne but most of my days were on the trails…
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Test Roll: Leica M4
It’s 3AM and I’m wide awake. In an hour I have a ride to catch to the airport where the long travel day to Zurich begins (more on that later). This is simply an exploratory trip, hopefully with some good photo opportunities. I’m bringing along my Bronica 6×6 and was planning on toting one of…
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Peakbagging the Kettle Falls Range
Northwest of Spokane lies a pocket of summits I’ve been eyeballing for months—about a dozen SOTA-qualifying peaks in the 6000–7000 ft range. With some free time and an itch to chase points and elevation, I mapped out a three-day backpacking trip in early June aiming to activate at least four eight-pointers. With almost zero familiarity…
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South Lookout Mountain W7W/WH-206
Found myself up in the Bellingham, WA area for a work function over Memorial Day weekend, so why not take advantage of the North Cascades and bag a summit? South Lookout Mountain looked quite doable and literally right across the street (and down a long road) from the Airbnb. This is early in the season,…
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Tamarack Ridge W7I/NI-256
Miles: 2.66Gain: 497ftQSOs: 6Points: 1 A relatively easy summit to bag, the biggest cost was the time it took drive the Forest Service roads to get to the start. This is Idaho, so it should go without saying that there’s logging activity. I keep thinking I should nab myself a little CB radio so I…
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Bracken Point W7W/WE-056
Miles: 5.76Gain: 1463ftQSOs: 4Points: 4 Almost immediately after leaving the parking lot, the ascent up the side of the ridge begins. It’s steep—gaining over 600 feet in the first quarter mile or so. The traverse across the ridgeline continues for another two miles, with plenty of additional climbing, until we topped out at the high…
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A Snowy Spring FA: W7I/NI-274
Summit: W7I/NI-274 “Hill 3860”Miles: 3.42Gain: 687ftQSOs: 6Points: 1 For April 4th the weather was prime, though I should’ve started earlier in the morning when it was colder—more on that later. The turn off for the FS roads/trails was completely snowed in (see photo), so I parked off of the hwy a hundred yards up at…
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First QSL Card
For the non-ham, a QSL card is basically a postcard-sized print copy confirmation of an on-air contact. Dating back to the days well before we were confirming contacts on the internet, QSL cards are a bit of a historical relic, or more appropriately, a tradition that is unfortunately not just modernly uncommon but also seemingly…
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Track Banners
The indoor track at the Washington State University student rec center (UREC) was a bit dated—at least a decade old at this point. They called me up to refresh the seven wall graphics around the track; each 7×9-foot installation a nod to a unique facet of UREC’s student recreation opportunities & spirit.
Outliving the bastards one hard-earned beer at a time.