Goat Mountain — Friday, Aug. 16, 2019

A coworker and I headed up to Goat Mountain on Friday for the first of our weekend of hiking around Mount Baker. Neither of us have done much on the trails in this area, and I was impressed and surprised to see what great condition Goat Mountain trail is in, particularly considering it is an old fire lookout route. 

The first 3 or so miles switchbacks at a fairly moderate pace, especially considering how steep most hikes to lookouts are. The forest is open and the trail is pretty wide and soft underfoot; great hiking. 

Once we popped out of the forest into the meadow, the trail got more rugged. In places the stairs were 2+ feet tall, making that section tiring to hike through. Luckily, it was cool and cloudy so we weren't too hot, but of course that also meant we didn't get any of the great views Goat Mountain is supposed to have. We could see Price Lake at the base of Shuksan, and parts of the Mount Baker Ski Area, but no peaks. 

However, we'd picked that hike in hopes of finding berries, and while we didn't find the ones I was really hoping for, we found A TON of hucks and blueberries. We spent almost 2 hours picking on our way down, and filled all the containers we brought. There were plenty left over. I'd never done a hike dedicated to berry picking, and I'm thrilled that this one was so heh...fruitful.