NEW GOAT ALERT!!!
Now that I’ve had a moment to digest what just happened over the last 6 days, I’d like to congratulate Ted, W6TED, for achieving Goat and joining the herd. Ted has been working toward this goal since his first summit activation in 2019. On May 18th, 2025, Ted broke 1000 activator points, becoming the next goat in the herd.
I was with Ted for the final push, 19 summits in 6 consecutive days for 188 points. We hiked 24 miles, climbed 5,302 feet while hiking. We battled high winds most days, with gusts over 50 mph. We were blessed with horrible solar conditions, wildfires, smoke, closed roads, and closed summits. We had constantly adjusted our plans to achieve our mission. The trek included over 1,800 miles of driving on US freeways, state highways, and some very rough primitive dirt rocky roads. We experienced cold for us Southern California boys while camping out with low temperatures of 28 f and sometimes lower if you figure in wind-chill.
I was there when Ted made his first SOTA contact in 2017, a chase, when he heard me on a local mountain while sitting in his vehicle. On May 18th, I was there in person when Ted made his 4th contact on Whiting Knoll, making him officially a SOTA Goat. After Ted mademad his 4th contact, we did a fist bump and the chasers started to flood in, congratulating Ted on his accomplishments. Ted is an awesome CW operator and an all around great dude.
If you want to read more about the challenges we experienced, I’ve documented the whole trip with pictures at [N1CLC: Road To Goat](http://hamninja.com/roadtogoat. Check it out!
Congrats Ted!
