Fellow fire lookout enthusiast here! Ray Kresek's book is definitely an awesome resource, and I'm planning to visit his museum in Spokane this summer.
Greg and I have been working on the
Oregon Fire Lookout Geocaching Challenge, which has led us on some very
interesting and
fun adventures. More often than not the roads that lead to lookouts or lookout sites are no longer maintained and are in HORRIBLE condition!
We've had so much fun working on the geocaching challenge that we've set ourselves another challenge: visit every standing fire lookout in Oregon (there are about 170 of them). We both work full-time and summers are SO short, so it'll probably take us awhile!
On a related note, after my Mt. Hood National Forest book is done I'll be working on a book of historic photos of Oregon lookouts (so if you have any such photos, let me know!
).
One of the coolest-looking lookouts is the
Warner Mountain Lookout, which is available as a rental (but unfortunately only in winter). What fun it would be to go up in that cupola and survey the world around you!
I'll give a little plug here for the
Forest Fire Lookout Association, which "promotes the protection, enjoyment, and understanding of lookouts." In many cases the Forest Service (or whoever the landowner might be) isn't doing much to preserve or care for lookouts on their land, so organizations like this are important.
