W7W/RS-033 Mt Ararat

Prologue:  Tuesday, Aug 12, Myself, Ms Pat WT7N, my Bro John KF7MYI, and Chuck AC7QN began a four day backpack trip in Mt Rainier National Park along the Wonderland Trail to the Indian Henry's Hunting Ground and Emerald Ridge areas.  Indian Henry's is a large meadow with four good sized peaks surrounding the meadow outskirts.  Three are SOTA Peaks- which the map shows highlighted in yellow.

Chapter 1:  Pat and I arrived early (about 2 PM) at Devils Dream back country campground and claimed our site by setting up our tent.  At 3 PM we agreed to head up the trail 1.1 miles to Indian Henry's meadow which is the beginning of the ascent to the top of Mt Ararat.  Garmin showed the climb to be about 800 ft elev gain in 3/4 mile.  My plan was to walk the Kautz Creek Trail until the apex was reached and then head up Ararat.  Why walk through brush when there is a trail some of the way?  Turns out that the route up Ararat from there was up a rocky face.  So we retreated back down the trail to a less steep approach according to Garmin.

Mt Ararat viewed about 3/4 mile east of the base.  The rock face with drop off can be seen in the center near the top.

Back in the  the 80's I'd trekked to the top of Ararat twice.  One of those outings I camped on the summit for two days to explore, to find the Ark, see flying saucers at night and hear and feel large ice chunks fall from the nearby glaciers.  Back then it seemed like an easy trek down/up to fetch water... but I can tell ya 30 years later that those trees have grown taller, the brush is thicker, and the slope is way steeper.  We headed up a rocky gully.  When that gully ran out we were in a sloping meadow, then another gully and it repeats until we reached the vast flat topped summit where a small plane could land.  The highest point looked to be 1/8 mile to the west... but Garmin said we were on the summit +/- 10 ft.

I figured out that a few folks musta been following my APRS tracks because as soon as I circled the the top of a small knoll to find a comfy spot... I began to receive calls on 146.52.  The fish pole mast was strapped to a snag tree, the 44 ft doublet was hung in an inverted Vee fashion, and radio set up in the shade.  OTA at 0004 UTC the next day.

The mosquitoes and biting flies were extra pesky and contributed to my Morse being extra sloppy.  

On each band I spotted myself via APRS to call sign-SOTA.  Only one Q on 40M- with Phil NS7P- who is always in my log, it seems. 4 Qs on 30M. When I got to 20M, I sent dah-dit-dah-dit-dah on 14.061, I was greeted with a cacophony of callsigns- pretty amazing.  15 Qs on 20M CW were made and many more that could be made but I had to shut down in order to have enough time for me and Pat to safely retreat down to the meadow and back to camp.

I decided to follow the 80's route down- due east- with the patrol cabin in sight- which took us to a rocky face with a drop off.  Uphill was needed and zig-zag to the south then down a series of gullies and in 45 minutes we were back to the meadow and the trail back to camp.  

Back in the meadow the National Park Service patrol cabin can be seen.  Some years this meadow can have 6 ft of snow in it in June.  This view of Mt Rainier shows the Tahoma glaciers.  

Thanks to the Ionosphere gods who made for low noise - high E layer propagation radio contacts during our outing.  Thanks to the chasers who waited until late in the day to make contact.  I am sorry we couldn't stay there longer and make more QSOs.

Flickr fotos with comments can be seen here:http://www.flickr.com/photos/kr7w-sota/sets/72157635130064235/


Best Regards,
Rich kr7w