Earlier this summer I was given a tremendous opportunity to volunteer staff the Goat Peak fire lookout outside Mazama, Washington near my beautiful home in the Methow Valley. After visiting all of Washington’s fire lookouts and becoming so enamored with their history, I couldn’t wait to experience a fire lookout from the perspective of being an actual lookout.
Since Lightning Bill moved to Leecher, Goat hadn’t been staffed for a full season in six years. I opened Goat on July 1, having no idea that in only a week I’d find myself right in the middle of a live action movie. Filson, who was working on a maintenance and painting project at nearby First Butte, stopped by Goat shortly after the start of the Cub Creek 2 fire to bring me a tasty lunch and talk fire lookouts. They took some beautiful photos and I wrote an article about my experience for their journal. I’ll definitely be posting more photos and stories from my summer at Goat soon. Enjoy!