Darrington WA Shooting Pit

I have been shooting at the Darrington Washington Shooting Pit for close to ten years. I generally go once a week some times twice a week from spring until the snow come down that low. .
I have been taking my grandson out there to shoot since he was four yesrs old, he will be ten on June 20th. .

When we go there we generally leave the house around 8-830 in the morning and stay there all day. We pack up when it starts to get dark. Mason shoots a lot every week. He can shoot better then most adults.
I bought him a 200 cc mini bike a few weeks ago so now we load that up so he can ride it up it the mountains.
I have a magnet from harbor freight that looks like a plunger for picking up shotgun hulls and steel rifle & pistol cases. Been picking them up for years. The shotgun hulls go in the garbage and I dump the steel rifle & pistol cases in the steel recycle bin at the transfer station.
Last year I put together a clean up day at the pit and eight guys came up to help with the clean up.
I will be setting up another clean up day next month.
I take a big ice chest with water, coke, sprite & budweisers for the guys.

Every week I pick up two or three buckets of shotgun hulls or steel rifle & pistol cases.
I also pick up any brass that happens to be left behind by other shooters.
One time I picked up 35 pounds of brass.
Yesterday i only picked up about pounds of brass, 30 caliber Carbine, 9mm & 38spl.

White Horse Mountain across the road where we go shooting.


Mason on his mini bike at the pit.


The buckets of trash steel rifle & pistol.cases.


White Horse Mountain on the way out last night.


When we got home we unloaded Masons mini bike and got a fire going in the fire pit and I have a few Budweisers.


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Two weeks ago a guy from down by Seattle came up to check out reloading. He orders a Lee press kit and waiting for it to come in. He brought his 40cal and 357 Sig. I had dies and everything to load some up.
He set the dies un in my Hornady single-stage Lock n Load press, resized them and loaded up fifty of each then we went shooting until it got dark.
My battery on the phone died so I didn't get any pictures. But I did take a picture today of the two buckets of steel rifle & pistol cases.

There are a bunch of mountains here that keep snow on them all year long.
Mt Baker is about 75 miles north-east from here and Mt Rainer is about 90 miles south-east of here.

Over by Silverton the glaciers have ice caves with a trail that goes up to them.

The 100 cc mini bike was two hundred dollars cheaper but was small compared to this one. I bought him the 4 year extended warrenty and the front & rear rack to carry stuff. He will get a lot of use out of it before he out grows it and moves on to bigger & better things.
He wants to get a quad, but they are four to five times the money for a desent one.

Yes take 530 east out of Arlington then the back way in from sweede haven road. There are three more pits going towards Rockport.
I generally do not go to them because they are farther and get a lot of action.

Here are a few pictures of another day of shooting at the Darrington pit with my grandson and a few friends.

White Horse Mountain on the way in to the pit.


Friends shooting and my grandson shooting Argitine Mauser reamed out to 308 Winchester.



Some friend

s shooting



My target stand is the one on the right.

Stuff we picked up, two buckets if garbage shotgun hulls and some brass, about twenty pounds if brass.


We alwsys have a good time up in the mountains.

Another day at the Dartington Pit

The Arlington airport if about two miles from.our house. We take the grandkids over to Ellie's resturaunt for breakfast a couple times a year so they can watch the planes land and take off.
Ellie's use to be over by the post office off of Smoky Point Bvld, they moved to a building right next to the runway.
I will.be checking into finding some one to take my grandson up for a ride and check out this area from up above.
One goal for this spring/summer.

The weather has been nice here for a few weeks, it is going to change tomorrow. If it doesn't rain Sunday we will be going up to the shooting pit to do some clean up, Mason can shoot and ride his mini bike.
I have some scrape metal.here I will.load up and then grab all the scrape steel from the pit and run it to the scrap yard on monday.
My shooting friend's aunt from California is comeing up here to Washington State on monday and wants to go shooting so I will take either tuie. or Wed off of work to go play.

A friend gave me a cargo carrier that slides in to a two inch trailer hitch reciever, it is missing the two piece of square tubing that attaches it to the truck. I stopped by Skagit Steel yesterdsy and bought a twenty-four inch piece of it for $27 to fix it so we can use it to haul his mini bike and leave the truck bed open.

CoalTrain49 said:

Is that the pit north of the Derrington Fairgrounds? The Swede Haven bridge over the Stilly was one of my projects years ago. I used to hike into the state land below Whitehourse Mtn. from Ash Rd. to hunt grouse. I wasn't aware that any of those pits were open but I haven't been up there in years.

Thanks for posting those pictures. Looks like
a great time, especially for your grandson. Keep up the good work.

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You have get to the pit from Sweede Haven Road by way of the 18 Road. We took the three grandkids to that bridge you are talking about last summer yo get wet & cool off.
The bridge we camp by is farther East on 435th. That lityle section by the high tension wire electric next to the sub-staion is private property and they put up a gate. We use to by pass the gate by way of the old railroad bed, but they put them concrete jersey barriers across the old railroad bed so you have to go in on the Sweede Haven Road, take the right on to the 18 Forest Service Road for about 3 or so miles then take the left onyo the 445th Road and that takes you to the shooting pit. A half a mile or more down the road past the pit takes you to the bridge across the Stilly river where we camp.
Beautiful place plus there is trout in the river.
When ever we camp there I always have garbage & soda/ beer cans to pick up. Last June we camped there for my grandsons birthday. Half a bag of soiled diapers and threr bags of regular garbage some azzwipe left in the fire pit we got a fire going.