Mt. St. Helens

I'm writing this blog from our laptop in a hotel room in the teeny tiny town of Kelso, Washington (which ironically has much more to offer than Oak Harbor). We came down here for 4th of July weekend to visit Mt. St. Helens.

I have always been fascinated by Mt. St. Helens, mainly because I had a pen-pal in elementary school who lived on the Oregon/Washington border and she used to tell me stories about visiting the mountain. I also always thought that it was the only active volcano in the continental United States, which I was promptly proved wrong about the moment we moved to Washington.

So for anyone who's been living under a rock for the past 30 years, Mt. St. Helens, in southern Washington state, erupted on May 18, 1980 in a massive explosion that literally blew off the entire top and side portion of the mountain, caused severe damage to the area and towns around it, and killed 57 people.

(On a side note, I had a horrifying moment when I realized how old I was a few days ago. We were planning the trip and Mr. V told me that the National Forest Service has been celebrating the 30th anniversary of the eruption. I knew that it erupted a little less than a year before I was born in 1981, but I guess I just wasn't thinking because I said "30th anniversary? There's no possible way that it has already been 30 years. It erupted less than a year before I was born.....ohhh...." That would be the moment when I think it really hit me that I am almost 30 years old. But anyway, back to the trip...)

This is what the mountain looked like before the 1980 eruption:
A few weeks before the eruption, a bulge began to form on the north side of the mountain (following several weeks of earthquakes and some very minor eruptions). I honestly can't even imagine seeing this, knowing full well that there would inevitably be a massive explosion when this bulge broke through the surface.
And on May 18th, around 8:30 in the morning, this happened:


All that was left, when the eruption was over, was this:
I think its safe to say that Mt. St. Helens is no longer a beautiful, majestic mountain (although there is a lava dome in the center of it, formed by the mountain slowly starting to rebuild itself, so maybe it will be big and beautiful again in the future).

So yesterday, Mr. V and I set off to visit Mt. St. Helens. It was definitely a very cool thing to see. Unfortunately, it was cloudy, which is nothing new to Washington, so we actually couldn't see the whole mountain, but we were able to see the crater, and since the mountain has lost thousands of feet off the top of it, we were told that the clouds really weren't covering too much of it. If they had just lifted a tiny bit, we would have been able to see the top.

I'm just happy that we got to see anything, because based on normal weather around here, and the live webcam set up at the mountain's viewing site this morning, many people come out here and see absolutely nothing because of the fog and clouds. I wanted to see the part of the mountain that had been blown off, and I did, so I was happy :-).

(park ranger at the visitor's center - if you look at the picture he's holding you can see the lava dome that has been growing in the crater for the past few years

(me at the visitor's center - before I gave in to the cold weather and changed into warmer clothes)

(driving to Mt. St. Helens)

(This place is a small visitor's center and an A-frame house that was destroyed during the eruption. The house is half buried in the ash from the explosion.)

(This is at the A-frame house...because you can't go anywhere in the mountains of Washington without finding a giant bigfoot statue somewhere.)

(front of the A-frame house buried in the ash)

(side of the A-frame house - it was really weird/cool to me to think that I'm standing on 6 feet of ash that has now just become the normal ground.)

(back of the A-frame house - I'm looking into the second floor because you can see into the bedroom and you can see just how quickly these people's lives were destroyed. The bedroom is still set up like people are living there...only now its covered in ash and rotting away.)

(Bigfoot drinking coffee because Bigfoot and coffee go hand in hand in Washington!)

(the edge of the blast zone...This is a new bridge built in place of the old bridge that was washed away from the mudslides caused by the eruption.)

(everything within the blast zone area was destroyed or drastically affected by the eruption)

(Me with Mt. St. Helens behind me to the right!)

(Mt. St. Helens -look closely and you'll see that everything around it is nothing but fields and fields of piles of ash)

(piles and piles of ash at the bottom of the mountain)

(looking into the crater of Mt. St. Helens...apparently the top of the mountain is right where the clouds are. It was amazing to me that almost the entire mountain was just literally blown away.)

(me and Mt. St. Helens)

(another one of Mt. St. Helens and the ash)

(this is a little hard to see but this is directly across from Mt. St. Helens...there is nothing but trees that were knocked down from the blast and ash. It looked like a nuclear wasteland.)

(It was hard to get a picture but this is a memorial to everyone who died during the eruption, with the mountain behind it.)

(another one of me and Mt. St. Helens)

(This is the reason why I am here spending one of our vacation days writing a blog post. This is Mr. V at the start of a really hard trail that goes up to the lowest point of the crater. He is hiking this as I type. I knew he'd want to do some crazy hike so I brought along stuff to entertain me for the day while he's off hiking. The park ranger told us that people who are afraid of heights and who don't have good balance aren't recommended to take this trail because it apparently gets pretty narrow and steep. Not exactly my cup of tea.)

(the reason why I am not hiking with Mr. V right now)

(total destruction)

(more fallen trees and ash)

(me sitting on a volcanic rock at Crystal Lake. The lake was formed during the eruption and all around it are piles of rock and ash. It was amazing to me to see the rocks because I can't even fathom the idea of the earth literally spitting out rocks this big - and this was one of the smaller ones.)

(a pile of ash and rocks at Crystal Lake)

So happy 4th of July everyone! Assuming that Mr. V makes it back from his hike in one piece then we'll be checking out the fireworks in this tiny town tonight!

Wonderful Washington Day 13

Mt. Rainer day!

Now I can finally say that I have been to he mountain that is on my license plate. For those of you who don't know, Mt. Rainer is a HUGE active volcano that looms up out of the clouds and can be seen from miles and miles away in all directions. If you've seen a Washington state license plate, that mountain is Mt. Rainer.

Carol was so excited about seeing Mt. Rainer, that she was literally bouncing off the walls for days, and needless to say, she was pretty happy when we finally arrived. The drive took us about 2 hours from Elizabeth's house, which was actually longer than I had expected.

Once we got there, there's really not a whole lot to say. Mt. Rainer is HUGE! Its covered in snow and glaciers, and it has the unique ability to appear like you are never getting close to it. It seems like as you walk closer to it, it just gets farther away (a tourist brochure actually said this too). We walked on a short trail at the base of the mountain which was beautiful. There were just endless fields of wildflowers and patches of snow. The snow fascinated us, especially since we had spent the last few days sweating like you wouldn't believe. It was still really hot while we were here, but the snow was still there, so that was interesting to me. I understand why there was snow on the mountain itself, but I didn't really understand why there was snow on the ground at the bottom. If you actually walk to hike ON Mt. Rainer, they recommend that you go with a guide and have a lot of climbing experience. According to another brochure, people who climb Mt. Everest typically "practice" by climbing other large mountains first - Mt. Rainer being one of those mountains. So for non-skilled climbers like us, the base of the mountain was the only place we walked.

The towns outside of the National Park were adorable. Directly outside one of the entrance gates was a town called Alpine. Or what used to be town called Alpine. 2 people, an older man and woman still live there, and they have painted their own sign that says "Welcome to Alpine - Population 2". Right by the sign is a house/store, so we went in and met the woman, and she told us that the town doesn't actually exist anymore, and her and her husband are the only ones who still live there. I was fascinated by that.

A few more miles down the road is an old train, that has been turned into a restaurant in another town that can't have more than 200 people in it, so thats where we ate dinner.

I'll let the pictures do the rest of the talking:

(I'm sorry, but this sign is just too funny to me.)

(Mt. Rainer)

(Glaciers on Mt. Rainer)

(more glaciers)

(Wildflowers and other mountains in the Cascades)

(the Paradise Inn - I want to stay here one day)

(all of us)

(This is written on the stairs leading to the most popular trail at the park.)

(Jan and me - We're pointing just in case you can't see the giant mountain behind us.)

(Mt. Rainer with no people in the picture)

(wildflowers, snow, and a giant volcano - all in one picture)

(waterfall that's being fed by the melting glaciers)

(another picture of the waterfall)

(all of us by the waterfall - we really liked the waterfall if you can't tell)

(playing in the snow)

(the former town of Alpine, Washington)

(the restaurant we ate dinner at)