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Fire lookout · Chelan County, Washington

Baldy Mountain

Chelan County, WA summit 14 miles west of Chelan; register and firelookout.com give a 1931 L-4 cab, now gone, but a visit found no trace of one.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Register and firelookout.com say the L-4 cab is gone; no removal year is given, and a visit found no trace of a cab.

Visit & stay

Gone: site only. The lookout no longer stands, so there is nothing to climb or rent.

Access

Access unknown

We do not know the access rules. Check with the land manager before you go.

Road to the top?
Unknown

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Type unknownL-4 cab (reported)The design: L-4
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1931
Height
Unknown
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Wenatchee National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
Chelan County, Washington
Coordinates
48.23875, −120.45676
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-wa-baldy-mountain-2

View from the cab

What the lookout saw from its cab: every ridge out to about 93 miles, the named peaks in sight, and other fire lookouts within view, worked out from terrain data in your browser.

This lookout is gone. The view is reconstructed from its recorded site and a typical height for a lookout like it.

Downloads about 4.3 MB of terrain data the first time.

Or see what it could see on the map: the ground in its line of sight.

History

Then and now

  1. 1931 BuiltL-4 cab reported as built; not confirmed, a visit found no trace of one (cite 3)Sources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
  2. No record between 1931 and 2012
  3. 2012 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterRegistered on the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterSource: firetower.org
  4. TodayGoneThe lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. When it came down is not recorded.

Old maps of this spot

USGS topographic maps from the years a lookout stood may show it, often as a small symbol labelled “Lookout”. See the old topo maps around it on the Firefinder map, or find every scanned sheet of this spot on USGS TopoView (click the spot there to list them, with dates and downloads).

Story

Researched 10 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

Baldy Mountain lies about 14 miles west of Chelan, in Chelan County, Washington.1 The Former Fire Lookout Sites register and firelookout.com both date a lookout here to 1931 and describe it as an L-4 cab.2,1 The register says the cab "is now gone" and gives no year for its removal.2 The firelookout.com entry is as brief: "1931: L-4 cab. Gone."1

The sources also differ on which forest the site belongs to. The register places it in the Wenatchee National Forest, while the Forest Lookouts page names the Chelan National Forest.2,3

Steve Willhite, who visited the summit, writes that a 1931 L-4 cab is reported for Baldy, but that he found no evidence of one.4 He describes a sheltered flat between the two highest rock knobs, with old cut stumps, fire rings and cans that suggest camping, and he thinks a camp may have been on the summit instead.4 He reports finding no building materials on the summit, such as anchors or concrete.4

The Forest Fire Lookout Association's Washington list files the site as a ground site with the status Gone.5

Willhite's route runs up the Entiat Valley Road past Ardenvoir, then along forest roads FR 5380 and FR 8410, and he advises high clearance.4 He gives an elevation gain of 1,000 feet and says a short scramble reaches the rocky top.4 No source describes a standing structure on the summit, and none says whether the site is open to visitors.2,4

  1. Baldy Mtn. Fire Lookout Cabin, firelookout.com, http://www.firelookout.com/wa/baldymtn.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Baldy Mountain Lookout Site, Former Fire Lookout Sites Register, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/wa/baldy-mountain-lookout-site/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. Baldy Mountain, Forest Lookouts, https://washingtonlookouts.weebly.com/baldy-mountain.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  4. Baldy Mountain Lookout Site, Steve Willhite, Washington Fire Lookouts, http://www.willhiteweb.com/washington_fire_lookouts/baldy_mountain/chelan_356.htm (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  5. Washington lookout list, Forest Fire Lookout Association, https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/wa/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩

Sources

  1. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- western US (Ron Kemnow's weebly sites) Gave us: name, location, county, status, agency, ownership, links Ron Kemnow's Forest Lookouts sites (westlookouts, californialookouts, idaholookouts, montanalookouts, oregonlookouts and washingtonlookouts .weebly.com) · No licence stated; facts only (county, land manager, status word, coordinates where the page's own map widget gives them, township-range-section, height and design hints, links). The site's own newspaper quotes, citations and narrative are not reproduced. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  2. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, status, agency, dates, links, fact-check Firefinder research (sources cited in the story footnotes) · Our own research notes; each fact cites its source in the lookout's story

More about this lookout elsewhere

Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.