There are a set of three peaks in close
proximity, Wolf Mountain, Lake Mountain, and Wishbone Mountain. I was hoping to do all three today but the
weather wasn’t having it... If I had left a couple hours earlier I could have
probably done it. My planned trail head
was about an 1.5 hours from the villa. I
decided to do sort of a loop through the area going from Vernon, AZ, down to
Mc. Nary. The summits would be between
the two towns. (click on pictures for larger)
[click on image for larger]
[click on image for larger]
I had charted a planned route off of a trail
up to Wolf Mountain but decided to deviate from that to possibly save
time. I probably didn’t. I found a quasi gulch filled with boulders
and scrambled up that. I wasn’t
expecting how far I would have to go.
The top was heavily forested and the antenna setup was easy. Sotawatch.org showed that there was only one
other station up on a summit and I tried a chase on CW but no joy.
I had OK cell service and was able to spot
myself and quickly logged 15 contacts on 20 meter. I looked for some other stations to chase and
after finding none decided to get off the mountain. Thunderstorms were working their way up from
the south and I wanted to hit one other peak at a minimum, and possibly 2 more
before lightning risk shut me down.
I followed the charted route back to the car,
(look for Wolf Mountain HERE) and it was a hell of a lot easier than the way over (as you can see on this track). The nice thing about taking a different route
back is it’s new and still provides a sense of adventure.
Once back at the car I headed over to Lake
Mountain. I spotted a sign for the lookout and followed that road. Turns out, this summit is a drive-up. Alen Allen, the lookout, invited me up to
take a look from the top of the tower.
He was a nice gentleman from Tucson.
He said this is his summer getaway with no mortgage payments. There’s a little cabin at the base where he
and his wife live. The forest here is
beautiful, with a great view in all directions.
He showed me a picture of the original lookout that was built into the
top of a huge tree. (I’ll try to find a
picture of it on the internet).
I setup not too far from the tower and quickly
pulled in 11 contacts. The GoPro needed
a battery change and I wanted to get my contacts before the lightning came too
much closer so I skipped the video. My
first contact was W0MNA, Gary from Kansas.
He was the first contact on Wolf Mountain as well. Martha, Gary’s wife, was contact #4, making
this summit fully activated. Gary must
have me or the area set on hamalert.com because he’s always up front on my list
of contacts.
I was contemplating heading over the Wishbone
Mountain but thought better of it. It
would take me an hour to summit that guy once I was at the trail head and I
didn’t want to chance having lightning over me.
I’ve leaned that you don’t need to have lightning coming down close
before you pack up. Your position can be
the first strike and it probably won’t end well. Net net, I headed back to the SOC (SOTA
Operation Center, AKA my cabin).
It was a pretty drive back with a stop in
Springerville for lunch. My original
plan was to go into Mc Nary and have an Indian Taco at a road side stand but
they were closed. My alternate was a
Sonic. Interesting thing, they had a
burger with “Hatch green chili”. The
green chili is very famous in this area and I’m guessing this isn’t a standard
burger everywhere. I ordered one and it
was quite good.
On the way back to the SOC I could see
lightning and rain in the area and on arrival we were in a bang’n
thunderstorm... but without the rain.
The rain came later but it was super light, nothing like I had see to
the west of the villa.
Summary: Nice hike in the forest, logged some
miles, activated two summits, and logged 20 more SOTA points. Now it’s a glass of wine and watch the rain
come down from my porch.
Contacts
Date:01/Aug/2019
Summit:W7A/AP-032 (Wolf Mountain) Call Used:N1CLC Points: 10 Bonus: 0 Delete
Time
|
Call
|
Band
|
Mode
|
17:01z
|
W0MNA
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:03z
|
KX6A
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:04z
|
K7GT
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:04z
|
N4EX
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:05z
|
KD1CT
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:05z
|
W0ERI
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:06z
|
NS7P
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:06z
|
K6EL
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:07z
|
KI5WA
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:07z
|
W5GAI
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:08z
|
K6QVB
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:08z
|
K0LAF
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:10z
|
NQ7R
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:10z
|
KD0MQO
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
17:11z
|
KI4TN
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
Date:01/Aug/2019
Summit:W7A/AE-030 (Lake Mountain) Call Used:N1CLC Points: 10 Bonus: 0 Delete
Time
|
Call
|
Band
|
Mode
|
19:05z
|
W0MNA
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
19:06z
|
K0LAF
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
19:07z
|
AF7MD
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
19:08z
|
W0ERI
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
19:08z
|
N4EX
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
19:08z
|
KI5WA
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
19:09z
|
WA2USA
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
19:10z
|
KD0MQO
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
19:10z
|
W4KRN
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
19:11z
|
KB6CIO
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
19:12z
|
WD0ACB
|
14MHz
|
SSB
|
Loadout for the multiple summits:
NOTE: The links for these were broken, I've updated them on my equipment loadout page.
NOTE: The links for these were broken, I've updated them on my equipment loadout page.
● Gregory Zulu 40 backpack
● First aid kit. Make sure it’s a good one... like ability to patch up an impalement wound. ● CHA MPAS with spike and additional MIL mast (and version 2 of the top section)
● 30’ of coax feed line
● Yaesu FT-2DR HT
● Slim Jim dual band antenna for my HT.
● 3 L of water (8 lb)
● iPhone with All Trails, MotionX GPS and sota goat
● LDG Z-100 plus auto antenna tuner for the FT 891
● Trekking poles
● Jetboil MicroMo cooking system
● Extra LiFePO Battery
● AnyTone AT-868UV DMR radio for testing.
● Custom wiine bottle cork paddles for CW (crafted by K6ARK)
● American Morse Porta Paddle for CW
● Delorme Inreach satellite tracker and communicator.
73,
N1CLC
Christian Claborne
(aka Chris Claborne)
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