Benton County High Point Trip Report
"Rattlesnake" (3,629 ft)
Date: December 10, 2001
Author: Dale Millsap
From West I-82, took WA-241 north to Lewandowski Road. Right on said road, past a big dairy, through
large ranch gate posted "private road." Four miles after leaving Lewandowski, there is a large metal gate
with a sign that says "Whoa, take it easy on the heiffers, keep the bulls in!
Please close the gate after yourself."
So I did. There are numerous roads, but I followed the one which had a previous vehicle track in
the snow, which continued about 2.5 miles until I came to a major high-tension power line going
north-northeast (it is shown in Delorme p58.)
From here, the road follows the power line quite closely all the way to the ridge.
(There are two barb-wire gates along this road which must be shut after passing through.)
The road gets quite steep in several places. This, combined with the snow, was good reason to shift into 2WD
low. Continue past the ridge about 1/8 mile and take a right. Be warned, although there is very little snow
down in Sunnyside, there is 9-12 inches at the ridge. The only reason my Cherokee made it was taking great
care to stay in the packed tracks of previous vehicles.
The HP is 1.5 miles along the ridge. I stomped around in the snow between the structures. I didn't bother
to look for the register, if there indeed is one, but I think a bump in the snow might have been the cairn
Stefan Feller mentioned in his report. Not much to see - the clouds had me socked in pretty good.
There was no way to turn around, so I "reversed" all the way back to the power line road (that was exhausting)
and wiggled the jeep around there and back down to Sunnyside and then Pasco.