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Monday, June 26, 2017

Ward Hills Fire Tower Again

 
Today I had several adventures. I'll tell you about the one I planned. Maybe you'll hear about the others later. (Maybe not!)

I had to go to Irons to interview someone for my newspaper column. On the way home, about the closest place to take a little hike was to go up to the old Ward Hills fire tower. You can still drive up there, but it makes a nice walk if you don't.

Here are the footings for the tower. It's easy to see three of them, but the fourth one is there. People now drive right up there and camp.

Ward Hills fire tower site

It looks like the last time I blogged about it was in 2010, so it's time you saw it again!

You would need a tower to get a view there any more. Although the site is a hill that drops away steeply on three sides (you can pretty much tell that in the above picture) and more gently on the road side, the trees have grown up all around. Here's the only bit of a view you have to the west now. You can just see some blue hills in the distance.

Ward Hills view

Actually, the most interesting thing is the foundation of the old tower keeper's house. I sure thought I had blogged about that before, but I can't find it, so you do get something new. It was small, but I always stand there and imagine what the house would have been like. I think it would have been a perfect place to live.

Ward Hills fire tower keeper's house foundation

The other interesting feature is the benchmark from the 1980 Geodetic Survey.

Ward Hills benchmark

The temperatures were cool today, only in the high 50's. Hey, I like it. You'll get no complaints from me. I had a nice interview, an interesting walk, and learned several new things (the other adventures you may hear about). I wrote this month's newspaper column. I feel refreshed to face another work week.

See Walking at Ward Hills
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