No View From Summit

Route

Captain Grey Mountain is a road walk of a few miles gravel through a mix of forest and clear cuts. The road is within the activation zone. It’s on land owned by Lewis & Clark Timberlands, and as such there is no driving up but non-motorized access is free with a Required Annual Permit, link below. **

Summary - A drive up on the west end of the Toutle range.

Just east of Mount Rainier National Park and north of Highway 12 is this bushwack activation.

 Take Highway 12 about 1.5 miles east of the turnoff for Highway 123 and go left (north) onto gravel FR45. A short 0.4 miles later, turn right (east) to continue on FR45 for 11.2 miles. The road is carefully Priusable, with the potholes increasing and the road width decreasing past the Cortright TH (which could provide access to other summits to the east). You'll find a good place to park near 46.6965, -121.5309 where FR45 starts to descend.

Signal Peak is a 12.7 mile Priusable drive up with some pot holes that are easily navigated.  It does not need a Weyerhaeuser permit for access.  Although you traverse through Weyerhaeuser land, the road you take is designed as a “Public Access Corridor” to the state forest where the Signal Peak summit is located. 

In the past (and for a prior writeup), this summit was off-limits as part of a leased club parcel. Maybe Weyerhaueser couldn't find any clubs to lease it, or just changed their mind about how they wanted to manage the land, but it has ceased as a lease and become open to public access. It's a bit of a drive for one point, but a unique nonetheless.

Drive: distance to Mcminnville plus 16 miles

Hike: 1.45 miles with 800' gain one-way

GPX routes uploaded to sotamaps.

Pig Iron Mountain is a drive up good gravel forest road plus a half mile light-to-moderate bushwhack through rhododenrons. As such it's reasonably easy enough to reach, though no view at the top to particularly recommend it compared to other local peaks.

We found no pigs, iron or pig iron. Totally misleading peak name. There was just a bunch of bushes. Maybe they are pretty assuming they flower in the spring time. Dunno. YMMV.

During the 2023 W7O SOTA Campout, we had the opportunity to activate Trap Mt.

This is an easy drive, though there are spots where the manzanita closes in on the roadway.  Your vehicle's paint may not like it much.  Otherwise, it has good gravel all the way to the trailhead.  Take a left from Hwy 138 West onto NF-900, then a right onto Big Camas Rd (NF-3701).   Take another left onto NF-3704 and follow that around and turn left on NF-230 and yet another left onto NF-250 and a final left on to NF-290.  Google Maps was right this time!

Long Mountain is on the Weyerhaeuser recreational permit area for Columbia - Washington Counties. It was previously activated via a 12 mile hike, but this is not the only route. As it turns out, there's a straightforward access trail via BLM land to the southeast of the peak, which only requires about 1.5 miles of hiking each way.

Driving route and hiking route GPX posted to sotamaps/SOTLAS.

Frog Lake Buttes is a popular SOTA destination that was moved slightly from its old high point in March of 2023. The old summit plays host to a cell tower and is accessible via both road and trail. The new summit lies approximately 0.4 miles NE of the old one with a deep enough col between the two that a new designator was assigned. This new summit requires a short bushwhack from the old and is easily accessible during summer months.