I’ve often said that Mount Herman (W0C/FR-063) is the most (ham) radio active mountain in Colorado. Many of us have operated from that summit for VHF contests, QRP events and Summits On The Air (SOTA). Of course, I didn’t have any data to back that claim…until now. A review of the cumulative SOTA activations in Colorado through Jan 1, 2016 shows these four summits as the most-activated SOTA peaks.
| Summit | SOTA Designator | Number of Activations |
| Mount Herman | W0C/FR-063 | 95 |
| Pikes Peak | W0C/FR-004 | 53 |
| Mount Evans | W0C/FR-003 | 33 |
| Squaw Mountain | W0C/PR-082 | 31 |
All of these summits are relatively close to the large population centers in the state. Also, they not that difficult to get to and some of them have roads that go to the top. Pikes and Evans are both 14ers but can be accessed via 2WD vehicles.
But what makes Mount Herman so special? It does not have a road to the summit — you definitely have to hike it, a little bit more than a mile one way with elevation gain of ~1000 feet. What makes the difference for Herman is that it is in the backyard of the well-known radio ham, goat hiker and SOTA enthusiast, Steve WGØAT. Steve has personally activated the summit more than 30 times AND he drags along mentors encourages other radio hams to join him. Frank KØJQZ did 22 activations, some with Steve and many on his own. (Frank just achieved SOTA Mountain Goat status, activating enough summits to earn 1000 SOTA points.) Fortunately for me, Mt Herman is about 4 miles as the GPS flies from my house, so I have worked that summit 31 times (usually Steve or Frank and always on 2 meters). I’ve also activated Mt Herman for SOTA three times, as described here: A Soggy Mount Herman SOTA Activation, Mt Herman: SOTA plus VHF Contest and Winter Assault on Mt Herman.
Here’s one of Steve’s fun videos that captures the first SOTA activation of Mt Herman, with his goat crew Peanut and Rooster (SK).
Frank and Steve, thanks for all of the Q’s from Mt Herman over the past years! See you on the air and on the trail.
73, Bob KØNR
July 2019 Update
I checked the SOTA database and Mount Herman still has the most activations, but the top four summits have changed with the addition of Genessee Mountain at #3.
| Summit | SOTA Designator | Number of Activations |
| Mount Herman | W0C/FR-063 | 217 |
| Pikes Peak | W0C/FR-004 | 111 |
| Genesee Mountain | W0C/FR-194 | 102 |
| Mount Evans | W0C/FR-003 | 75 |
Interesting article, Bob! Although I haven’t kept track, I bet I’ve operated at least double the number of my SOTA log entries before the SOTA program began. Mt Herman is a great RF site albeit there’s lots of hiker tourist traffic on weekends it’s still a fun place to launch RF be it HF/VHF/UHF. You never know what DX will pop up! Plus the hike is a nice calorie burn just to make a few QSOs!
73, Steve/wGOAT
Yeah, same here. I was surprised that I only had 3 SOTA activations. I had operated from Herman many more times “pre- SOTA”, usually for a VHF contest.