The tides weren't favorable and it was supposed to rain, so we
decided on an off-season visit to Mount St. Hellens for our latest
little adventure. How do I know it was "off-season"? There are signs all
over the place telling you that most of the tourist services are open
from May through October. There are at least 3 official visitor's
centers that have probably been closed since the pandemic started. They
might open again in May. There are all sorts of places to stop and look
around. Many of them have restrooms. All of the government owned
restrooms are closed this time of year.

We stopped at a cheesy gift shop to look at their cheesy Bigfoot
statue. They expect to open in the middle of April. Even though they
were closed their public restrooms were open. I thought that was a nice
touch. Along with the big foot statue they have a huge old steam driven
tractor and the top of an A-frame that the volcano had buried.

https://www.roadsideamerica.com/story/9057

https://bigfooteruption.com/usa/pacific/washington/shops-wa/north-fork-survivors-gift-shop/

For the past 85 years there has been a small grocery store in the
last little town you pass through on your way to the mountain. There was
a fire there on March 9th. So the store and its gas pumps are closed for
now. There's another gas station in that area that looks like the owner
walked away from it sometime after the eruption. So, if you need gas or groceries Castle Rock, on I-5, is your last chance.

https://tdn.com/news/local/drews-grocery-in-toutle-devastated-by-fire-wednesday-morning/article_5e773e34-4a35-5e3e-9beb-d6d6def4ba87.html

The top of the mountain was in the clouds and the last 6 miles of
the highway to the last official visitor's center is closed until May.
There is still a lot to see. We visited the silt dam that was built to
keep many tons of mud from flowing further down the mountain,

https://www.columbian.com/news/2018/nov/14/fight-over-mount-st-helens-silt-in-cowlitz-river-will-continue/

"Fight over Mount St. Helens silt in Cowlitz River will continue
Battle will continue for decades, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says"

One of the most visibly striking features of that area is the
trees. There are no old growth trees in that area and most of the trees
are roughly the same age and height. The other notable feature is the
mud flow in the bottom of the valley. It's roughly 150 feet deep. It
doesn't look like there's much nutrition in that soil because the
vegetation hasn't grown back there the way it has in other areas.

On our way home we made a small detour for the Wahkiakum county
ferry and rode that back to Oregon.

https://www.co.wahkiakum.wa.us/252/Ferry

TB

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* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)

On 3/15/2022 8:09 AM, Ralph E Lindberg wrote:

On 2022-03-15 03:33:30 +0000, Technobarbarian said:

       The tides weren't favorable and it was supposed to rain, so we >> decided on an off-season visit to Mount St. Hellens for our latest
little adventure. How do I know it was "off-season"? There are signs
all over the place telling you that most of the tourist services are
open from May through October. There are at least 3 official visitor's
centers that have probably been closed since the pandemic started.
They might open again in May. There are all sorts of places to stop
and look around. Many of them have restrooms. All of the government
owned restrooms are closed this time of year.

       We stopped at a cheesy gift shop to look at their cheesy
Bigfoot statue. They expect to open in the middle of April. Even
though they were closed their public restrooms were open. I thought
that was a nice touch. Along with the big foot statue they have a huge
old steam driven tractor and the top of an A-frame that the volcano
had buried.

https://www.roadsideamerica.com/story/9057

https://bigfooteruption.com/usa/pacific/washington/shops-wa/north-fork-survivors-gift-shop/


      For the past 85 years there has been a small grocery store in
the last little town you pass through on your way to the mountain.
There was a fire there on March 9th. So the store and its gas pumps
are closed for now. There's another gas station in that area that
looks like the owner walked away from it sometime after the eruption.
So, if you need gas or groceries Castle Rock, on I-5, is your last
chance.

https://tdn.com/news/local/drews-grocery-in-toutle-devastated-by-fire-wednesday-morning/article_5e773e34-4a35-5e3e-9beb-d6d6def4ba87.html


      The top of the mountain was in the clouds and the last 6 miles
of the highway to the last official visitor's center is closed until
May. There is still a lot to see. We visited the silt dam that was
built to keep many tons of mud from flowing further down the mountain,

https://www.columbian.com/news/2018/nov/14/fight-over-mount-st-helens-silt-in-cowlitz-river-will-continue/


"Fight over Mount St. Helens silt in Cowlitz River will continue
Battle will continue for decades, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says"

       One of the most visibly striking features of that area is the >> trees. There are no old growth trees in that area and most of the
trees are roughly the same age and height. The other notable feature
is the mud flow in the bottom of the valley. It's roughly 150 feet
deep. It doesn't look like there's much nutrition in that soil because
the vegetation hasn't grown back there the way it has in other areas.

       On our way home we made a small detour for the Wahkiakum county >> ferry and rode that back to Oregon.

https://www.co.wahkiakum.wa.us/252/Ferry

TB

It's always an interesting trip. We've been going up there nearly yearly since the late 80s when the only access road was coming in the back way
via Windy Ridge and the trails down on the Pumace Plain were still
closed due to "thermal features"
Today it's a young forest.

There is a proposal to extend the road that ends at the Johnston Ridge Observatory swinging north of the area and connecting the the roads on
the east side near Windy Ridge

This sounds like a good idea because you could see other parts of
the mountain without driving back out of there and back in through a
different route. It could make Ape Caves easier to visit. It's hard to
imagine where they would come up with the money when there are so many
other important projects that need funding. I was a bit surprised by how
much money had already been poured into that area.

One of the striking things about Washington's highway system is
that it looks like a lot of the highways started out as logging roads
that were eventually connected and are now main roads. We went overland
from the Spirit Lake highway to highway 4, skipping around Longview.
Instead of one long highway it was a series of small roads with
different names.

TB

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