[Eric Willhite]

...

[flatsqwerl]

Nice sweeping views.

[Nancyann]

Eric, as I just mentioned in my Blue Mountain post, Ten Four was called Mt. Sultan by Harvey Manning in Footsore 2, Second Edition, and Sultana rises directly south of Haystack, a little over 600 ft higher. He describes it as "at the opposite tip of the horseshoe ridge enclosing headwaters of Youngs Creek". Nice TR btw, do you know the names of the smaller pyramid-shaped peaks south and slightly east of Three Fingers? I am guessing Big Bear and Liberty Mountains, but not certain.

[jboealps]

Good Report -- Now I need to go there.

[JimK]

Good report. That's a seldom visited place. I hiked it via the road on 3-07-15. No snow that year. 18 miles to the lookout site round trip. The first 5 miles gain 800'. The last 4 gain 2800'. Would be easy biking to where the grade suddenly steepens. Interesting views of the Cascade front down to Fuller Mt., Mt. Si, and Rattlesnake Mt. Is the 8 1/2 mile marker still there?

[Pyrites]

I did some precommercial thin in my youth. It wasn't an uncommon part of the prescription to drag all thinned trees either 100,150, or 200' from road. A horrible, deep barrier was created. The thinned area was a mess. I assumed deer and elk stayed out. And I wondered how long until branches rotted enough that snow squashed cut trees flat. Olympics.

[Dusty Trale]

Back in 1968 the DNR still had a forest fire lookout tower on Haystack Mtn. south of Sultan. I was on the 20 man forest fire crew that summer while going to college based out of the DNR's Sultan office/compound with a two story fire crew barracks, office, shop/garages for fire trucks and crew vans (now owned by the City of Sultan). When the forest fire tower was removed from Haystack Mtn. I was up there with the fire crew. A D-6 cat was used to pull the tower down with a cable and winch. The wood from the cabin and tower was loaded on to a dump truck and hauled away. At that time the DNR had switched from fire lookout towers to airplanes for spotting forest fires.

[Mesahchie Mark]

I climbed Ten-Four on Saturday (2/18/17), taking the long forest road approach described in the full report. I was able to mtn bike in on the relatively flat road for 4.5 miles, avoiding the occasional downed tree, when the grade of road steepens significantly. I (mostly) pushed my bike up to 2400' el, where there was snow on the road, and hiked the rest. I was able to put on snowshoes by 2800' el. The rain changed to snow by the time I reached Airplane Lake. The rest of the climb went well despite poor visibility. I did not attempt to go to the lookout site. I summited by 3:40 PM, then headed back as quick as I could to preserve the remaining daylight. The bike ride out was remarkably smooth - I only wish I had dry gloves to keep my fingers from freezing! I made it back to the car by 6:15 PM, sans headlamp. No pics taken - too freakin' wet and no views to be had. I think I need to upgrade my map software - lots of extra spur roads up there that weren't on my custom map!

[brewermd]

I was wondering if you could provide the coords for the lookout location. I can't find that lookout on the fire lookout websites nor other sources. I found a mention of it on the summitpost webpage for Haystack Mt. (explaining that the lookout wasn't there). I can tell on the map where you are indicating but wanted coords to make sure. Thank you.

[Magellan]

The lookout is long gone. Eric seems determined to document every lookout site in the state.

[brewermd]

I know the lookout is gone. I am also one of those that goes to former lookout sites.

[SultanHiker]

I went up there a different way. Sept 2017. Came from much farther west and biked in a really long way and approached the ridge from the south side. I reached two interesting sites and the true summit. There is no tower currently, but it looks like an old radio installation: antennas, solar, propane tanks.

47.809, -121.751 photo sphere image opens new window and you may have to click to get 360 view in 1957 maps this location was called Haystack Lookout or Lookout Tower The 1989 TOPO labels this place Radio Facility There is a newer installation up higher to the east labeled 4118 on some maps 47.808, -121.728

As shot through my telescope from home.

And true summit is farther east labeled 4384 on the maps. If you stay on the roads as far as possible, you can cut your bushwack down to 1/4 or 1/3 mile to reach it. Not much to see. Very dense trees prevent any good views. I think i found lightning strikes on many trees at the summit

For the longest time, I called this mountain the Unnamed Ridge. I couldn't find any maps that named it. But at 4300+, I was baffled that it wasn't named on most maps. Haystack has a name for goodness sakes! Then I happened to look it up on peakbagger. Now i know where to find names for every tiny mound as well as the big ones. I was able to bike most of it until i hit some old clear cut and ditched the wheels. The rest was easy hiking. The way up was tough to bike in some spots. But the downhill was overheating my brakes like crazy. Made the descent go blindingly fast. Had to stop in the middle of these ramps and let the brakes cool down.

link to alternate route I suppose i just should have started a new trip report....

[Joey]

Here is a map centered at Airplane Lake. Change to one of the satellite views to see all the roads. View larger size in new window