Devils Mountain... meh

Summit #44 of 70--October 27, 2023

When you hike up a mountain named for the Devil, you kind of expect something special, right? Something odd or scary. Spooky maybe? But this particular Devils Mountain south of Mount Vernon, was about as unnerving as a platter of deviled eggs. Another ho-hum wooded knob among thousands of others like it in western Washington. Perhaps there’s an origination story, but it had better be at least as spicy as eggs and mustard.

I’d found the hike listed online somewhere, as a local high point with views, despite a forest of radio towers planted near the apex. We wanted something fairly easy for a sunny fall day while running a couple errands. Two miles up with a 900-foot elevation gain to a view sounded just right.

The trek follows a gated road on state land to the top, with a very nice view of Mount Baker and the Sisters Range a bit over halfway up. Once on top, I realized we were probably about five years late for the summit views I’d read about. We could see a bit of the Cascades, a little more of the Salish Sea, but not nearly as well as from Little Mountain Park three miles to the northwest. Unfortunately for us, the trees are now tall enough to begin obscuring the views from what must have been a great vantage point not so long ago.

With more time, we might have poked around more to find a bigger opening, a dollup of mustard to spice things up. Nevertheless, We enjoyed seeing Baker and the Sisters again on the way down, and also noticed that even Glacier Peak’s snowy mass was visible to the east, right behind Whitehorse Mountain. And we got a little workout to boot, plus summit #44 was in the bag. So not a total loss.

But I do wonder about the name.