The shortest access point is on a gated Weyerhaeuser road near Cove Beach. Before you get to the clearcuts, there are 250 yards of fine coastal rain forest, with some impressive old cedars and spruces under the jurisdiction of Oswald West State Park. The logging road continues above the headwaters bowl of Short Sand Creek and connects with Arch Cape Mill Road, this section of the hike being on land managed by EFM (Ecotrust Forest Management), which acquired it from Stimson Lumber a few years ago. (Hikers and cyclists are permitted on both the Weyerhaeuser and EFM plots, but no camping and no campfires – obviously – are allowed.)
The views open up as you ascend Arch Cape Mill Road. Castle Rock, off Arch Cape, appears and then the sweep of Cannon Beach up towards Tillamook Head. The road, now bisected at regular intervals with drainage ditches, was carved into a wonderful face of dark pillow basalt breccia. As at Saddle Mountain and nearby Onion Peak, the basalts that compose Angora Peak are part of the Columbia River Basalt Flows, which formed pillow lavas when they encountered sea water. The road turns into forest, first offering wonderful views to the ocean and to looming West Onion Peak above the Arch Cape Creek drainage.
There’s a long traverse on the east side of the long northwest ridge to where the road becomes overgrown. Before that, you get a glimpse of one of Angora’s satellites, Little Angora. (Here’s a Summit Post article that details the three main climbing opportunities at Angora: https://www.summitpost.org/angora-peak-oregon/931152.) From the road, a trail leads up to skirt the overgrown section and arrives at a saddle. From the saddle, the path splits. Going right took me on a detour to the “hermit hut” and a socked in viewpoint. The hermit hut has suffered roof collapse - perhaps a small tree or gratuitous vandalism. (In the Summit Post thread, there’s an interesting explanation of the hermit hut’s history.)
The trail soon reaches Arch Cape Mill Road again, but this section is long abandoned and completely fallen away in a couple of spots, with sketchy detours around the collapses. The road bed is also overgrown in places, and I spent time dismembering a couple of recently toppled alders that were impeding progress. Where Arch Cape Mill Road turns towards the Angora Pinnacle, I took a spur road left. This spur leads to a scramble trail up Angora’s summit ridge. There’s a magnificent viewpoint, from which I could admire the pea soup to the south and the looming visage of Revenge of Angora growling into the mist. For the actual summit, only a few feet higher but viewless, I ducked back into the woods and maneuvered around some massive boulders to reach the highest point at a pile of mossy rocks.
