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Fire lookout · Okanogan County, Washington

Setting Sun Lookout Site

Also known as Setting Sun Mountain

Okanogan National Forest L-5 cab on Setting Sun Mountain: built 1932 or 1933, removed or destroyed 1953. Willhite found a stovepipe, phone line and anchors there in 2022.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. L-5 cab removed or destroyed in 1953; WillhiteWeb found a stovepipe, phone line and anchors at the site on a 2022 visit

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
Trail
Hiking distance 2 miles one-way with 1,700 feet of elevation gain, per WillhiteWeb; the terrain is open and easy to navigate

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Ground-level cabL-5 cabThe design: L-5
Built of
WoodGoing by its design; no source says so in words.
Built
1932
Height
Unknown
Elevation
7,253 ft (2,211 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service
Land
Federal land
Location
Okanogan County, Washington
Coordinates
48.69796, −120.44513
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-wa-setting-sun

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 4.4 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. 1932 BuiltRegister and Rex's page give 1932; WillhiteWeb dates the L-5 cab to 1933Sources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
  2. No record between 1932 and 1953
  3. 1953 RemovedRegister says removed; Rex's page and WillhiteWeb say destroyedSources: firetower.org, firelookout.com, willhiteweb.com
  4. No record between 1953 and 2012
  5. 2012 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterDate registered per FFLOS detail page: November 19, 2012Source: FFLOS register entry
  6. TodayGoneThe lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left.

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 9 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

Setting Sun Mountain lies in Okanogan County, eight miles north-northwest of Mazama, within the Okanogan National Forest.1,2 The register gives 1932 as the year the L-5 cab was built.2 WillhiteWeb reports that the cab went up in 1933, and it cites two Wenatchee Daily World articles.3 One said Roma Johnson had blazed a trail for an emergency lookout on the mountain.3 The other said Tracey Heath was nearing completion of a new Forest Service lookout station on the peak.3 The sources disagree on the year, so both dates are given here.2,3

The Goat Peak lookout, five miles south, had no view into the Lost River Valley.3 When lightning struck in that area, its watchman would hike the connecting ridge to the unoccupied Setting Sun cab and check for fires before walking back.3

The register says the L-5 cab was removed in 1953.2 Rex's Fire Lookout Page and WillhiteWeb say it was destroyed that year.1,3

Willhite visited in 2022 and found a stovepipe and roof cap, an anchor set in the rock, part of an outhouse, and stacked rocks around the site.3 He writes that the phone line running east toward Sweetgrass Butte was never removed, and that some insulators can still be found along the upper ridge.3 His older photos were taken before a fire killed most of the trees on that ridge.3 The hike is two miles one way, with about 1,700 feet of climb, over terrain he calls open and easy to navigate.3

  1. Setting Sun Fire Lookout Cabin, Rex's Fire Lookout Page, https://www.firelookout.com/wa/settingsun.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Setting Sun Lookout Site, Former Fire Lookout Sites Register, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/wa/setting-sun-lookout-site/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Setting Sun Lookout Site, WillhiteWeb.com Washington Fire Lookouts, http://willhiteweb.com/fire_lookouts/setting_sun_lookout/winthrop_111.htm (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

Photo of Setting Sun Lookout Site
Photo: Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source

Photos keep their own rights and are shown with credit. Is one of these yours? You can ask for a different credit or for removal.

Sources

  1. Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (FFLOS) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, what it is built of, register numbers, agency, ownership, dates, photos, links Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved (American Resources, Inc.); facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  2. Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists Gave us: type, status, register numbers, links Forest Fire Lookout Association (firelookout.org) · No licence stated; facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  3. firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page Gave us: links firelookout.com · No licence stated on the site; facts only (coordinates, elevation, built/destroyed years, design, agency). Photos mirrored with the site's stated credit. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  4. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- western US (Ron Kemnow's weebly sites) Gave us: 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
  5. WillhiteWeb.com: Washington Fire Lookouts Gave us: links WillhiteWeb.com · No licence stated; names and page links only (the site's photos and text are not reproduced). · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  6. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, status, staffing, visiting details, 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.