Bauers in Seattle

[Jack] The final big trip of Chris and Matt's visit was to Mt. St. Helens. A month ago Chris saw that Mt. St. Helens was again being opened to climbers after a 2 year closure. I got online and secured 3 of the 100 reservations for Wednesday, August 16th. Each day they allow 100 people to trek to the top of the volcano.

We headed south to the mountain early on Tuesday and signed in at Jack's General Store (nice name!) and got our actual climbing permits. Then it was off to the volcano.

First stop - the Ape Caves!

This is a cave that was formed when a lava flow came down the side of Mt. Rainier 1,900 years ago. It was discovered relatively recently - in 1947 - by a logger. The lava flowed down the mountainside and much like a stream in winter where ice forms over the top while water flows underneath - the lava solidified on the top while it continued to flow. The tube where the lava was flowing emptied into the countryside below and left a long winding cave.

We arrived at the caves and were just in time for the hourly tour by Sue, one of the National Forest rangers. We were also lucky because we were the only people on the 3:30pm tour. Sue did a great job describing the features of the cave, answering our questions, clearing up our misconceptions, and showing us around. We had two lanterns to light our way and after the 45 minute tour was completed the three of us wandered deeper into the cave.

The levels of past lava rivers were easily seen on the walls - ridges like on a riverbank. And the ceiling was almost closed off in several spots. Here's a picture of Chris and Matt underneath "The Meatball" - a large rock that got stuck in a narrow ceiling area (during a lower level flowing of lava a second ceiling - beneath the original high ceiling - almost formed here). The cave goes for a mile in each direction from the entrance and we had a fun time looking around.

Oh yeah - there are no apes at the Ape Cave. The name comes from the first explorers of the cave in 1950's - a group of boy scouts who called themselves the St. Helens Apes...

We then headed on to Climbers Bivouac to find a campsite for the night.

This is a drive-in campground that has recently been expanded to allow Mt. St. Helen's climbers an overnight location for starting hikes up to the top of the volcano. Our campsite had a couple spots for our tents, plenty of dry wood for our fire circle, and all the comforts of home. Well, almost. There was no water. But we had bought a couple gallon jugs of water at the Cougar General Store - so we were set.

After taking a hike up to the treeline (about two miles from camp) to check out the following day's route, we returned to the comforts of camp. Matt wrote a postcard to his girlfriend Bethany using his headlamp (check out the speed of that pen!) and we relaxed in anticipation of a big day.

We decided to leave around 9am since the previous day the clouds had broken up early in the afternoon. The morning was socked in - the afternoon was beautiful blue skies.

On the morning of the climb we woke to fog. Actually we woke to the inside of a cloud. It was misting slightly and cool. Visibility was very limited. We packed up the wet tents and threw them into the car along with the rest of our stuff. Then we hit the trail.

The first two miles was familiar - we had walked up there the previous night. That took us from 3700 feet in altitude to about 4800 feet.

Then it got rough. The trail - no, "trail" isn't the right word - the route went up steeply with a few standing wooden posts to guide us along the route. We followed them in the fog and climbed over large rocks that covered the volcano's side. This was tough and dangerous work. The rocks were sharp and rough. The clouds and mist kept us cool as we climbed. We followed footprints in the volcanic ash - but sometimes they either followed a bad path or just disappeared in the rockfield. We continued to climb from one pole to the next and eventually, around 6500 feet in altitude, we reached the top of the clouds and broke through to sunshine.

Then, instead of cool and wet it became warm and sunny. We continued to follow the rocks and sometimes it seemed like the poles were directly overhead - the climb was that steep.

Finally, the rocks gave way to volcanic ash. And it got even tougher to climb. The ash was thick and the trail went straight up the mountainside. No switchbacks. No easing of the climb. Straight up. With each step we would slide back half a step. The air was thin, the sun was hot, the ash was blowing around. It was tough. High above us the other climbers were in a line heading to the top and we could see some very tiny people standing at the top. When we got up there, it turned out surprisingly that they were full sized people!















We climbed on and eventually joined the crowd at the rim - about 8100 feet.

Around us we could see Mt. Rainier, Mt. Adams, and Mt. Hood standing up through the clouds like islands in a huge white ocean. Inside the volcano was a huge lava dome that has been building up for several months. We sat with our feet dangling over the edge and watched as rocks fell down off the dome.

At one point a huge rockfall started on our side of the dome and continued for a couple minutes. It also sent up huge plume of smoke - just like a volcano!

We broke out the summer sausage, cheese and crackers (thanks Matt for carrying this 5 pounds of food!) and gorged ourselves until we could eat no more. All the while the volcano continued to rumble and shake below our feet.

Eventually, after about an hour, we headed down the mountain.

The first part of the trip down through the ash was easy - we almost slide down the moutainside as the ash was very easy to walk on and we made fast progress (though the blowing ash was a bit of a drag...). Then we hit the rocks. As tough as they were to go up - it was twice as tricky going down. We climbed over the rocks carefully and eventually reached the top of the clouds again. Down into the fog we went and the rocks continued to lay below us - only now slippery from the mists. We followed the poles and eventually reached the edge of the forest again. All safe and sound.

Through the woods and back to the car where we piled in and headed to Jack's General Store for some ice cream.