We went camping at the Iron Creek Campground in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest just north of Mount St. Helens and south of Mount Ranier this weekend. We arrived Thursday afternoon and set up our new tent. It's a 6-person tent with space for our queen-sized cot and lots of room left over. This is the first time we've used the cot. It's pretty heavy to lug a round, but much nicer for sleeping on without having to get up and down off the ground. Plus, we can store our bags under the bed and have even more room in the tent. It is quite luxurious camping. It was rainy as we drove down, but stopped by the time we got there, so we were able to get set up without any problems. Our friends Jonica and Dinah arrived after dinner. Jonica is the one who arranged the trip.
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| Dinner in front of our new tent |
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| Sandra is our resident firebug |
Friday after breakfast, we drove to the Jumbo's Shoulder trail for hiking with Jonica and Dinah. It took over an hour to get to trailhead, the last 5 miles over a really primitive dirt road. Still, the dirt road got us up pretty high in elevation so that was nice to have the car do the first part of the climb for us. We hiked the mile up the Sunrise trail, mostly straight up, no switchbacks. But we made it okay, with only a lot of huffing and puffing and a few rests along the way. It was relatively shadey, so that made it cooler.
Then we hiked another .6 miles across a ridge. The views were fantastic. At various times we saw Mt. Adams, Mt. Rainier, and a bit of the peak of Mt. Hood. The slopes were covered with beautiful wildflowers. The most common kind we saw was Indian paintbrush. Here's what else I can remember: strawberries, lupines, larkspur, two kinds of lilies (see tiger lily below), asters, columbine, and others we couldn't identify.
The trail was hard because it has been used by motorbikes so in many places there were deep ruts in the trail. It was kind of like walking on a balance beam in reverse.
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| Mount Rainier from the trail |
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| Tiger lilies |
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| Another view of Mount Ranier |
After 1.6 miles, the trail took another turn straight up, so we decided we had reached our limit. We headed back and our friends went on up to the higher meadow. They are much more experienced hikers than we are. And we're not quite back up to our pre-pnuemonia level, but we're getting there.
It was a great hike. It seemed so quiet with only the bees and flies and birds making noise. We didn't pass anyone on the trail.
In the evening, we had a fire and sat around with our friends (Joyce and Lois had joined us now).
Friday, we hiked on the Norway Pass trail at Mount St. Helens park with Jonica, Dinah, and Lois. This hike is on the slopes just north of Mount St. Helens. This trail was very different from yesterday with very little shade and a good ash and pumice trail. It was also less steep all at once, with switchbacks and more variation in up and flat and some down going up. It was also much busier. We were passed by or passed lots of hikers going up and down. We were surrounded by mountainsides that had been stripped by the Mount St Helens eruption in 1980. They're still pretty bare with dead trees lying all aligned, but some green coming through now (34 years later). I still couldn't go quite as fast as our friends and they wanted to go further than us, so we lagged back and they went on ahead.
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| Hillside from Norway Pass Trail |
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| More dead trees from 1980 |
We saw lots of wildflowers again, including paintbrush, lots of strawberries (with ripe berries this time, yum!), fire weed, dandelions, foxgloves, thistles, and many more.
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| Ripe strawberries |
When we got to Norway Pass, we had a spectacular view of the Mount St. Helens crater and Spirit Lake. We enjoyed the view for a while and took photos. (The selfie below was taken with my little gorilla tripod with an iphone clip and an app that let's you do a ten second timer.) Then we had lunch and started back down. Even though the temperature was probably just around 70 degrees, with the hot sun and hiking, it felt really hot. The pumice and ash trail was difficult going down and I slid in some of the steeper spots. I was very glad to have my hiking poles.
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| Mount St Helens and Spirit Lake from Norway Pass |
Sunday we decided to take a day of rest. We drove into Randle (10 miles) and had breakfast. They also had wifi so we could check email. There's no cell service at the campground or even in Randle. Then we came back to camp and took a walk on the trail that runs around the perimeter of the camp ground. It's a beautiful walk, easy and mostly flat, through old growth forest. A section of it goes along the Cispus River with a few nice beach-y spots, although the water is really cold and swift as well. We saw a Douglas fir that was 8 feet in diameter and about 600 years old.
Our friends Lois, Joyce, and Dinah left to go back north, but three of us stayed two more days.
In the evening, we went to a wildlife viewing area near some wetlands about 5 miles from camp. The only wildlife we saw were frogs, flies, and mosquitoes. That was a little disappointing.
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| Walking the loop around the campground |
Monday morning, we headed out to the Juniper Peak trail. This trail is part of the same trail system from Friday, but coming towards the peak from another direction. The first two and half miles were in shaded forest which was good because this day was a bit warmer than the other days: up to 80 degrees. The trail was also rutted by motorbike traffic, but had more flat spots on the sides of the ruts, so not as bad as the trail on Friday. Jonica hiked with us about two miles, then she took off at her faster speed as she was going to the peak. We didn't figure we would make it that far.
Once we got out of the woods, we saw beautiful views of Mount Adams and the valley between. There were also beautiful wildflowers, although not as many as the ridge on Friday, It's interesting how each slope seems to be in a slightly different season.
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| Goat Rocks from Juniper Peak Trail |
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| Mount Adams from Juniper Peak Trail |
We made 3 of the 4 miles towards the peak before we decided to turn around. Once we got out of the trees, it was really hot and the flies start attacking. We put on bug spray, which stopped them from landing so much, but didn't keep them from buzzing us.
We hiked back to a shady spot to have lunch, but couldn't rest too long because the bugs just mobbed us when we were still. On the way back down we heard this strange noise. We thought it was a truck on the distant highway, but the sound just kept going. Then we thought it was a jet, but it still went too long for that, too. All of a sudden, we realized it was motorbikes coming up the trail towards us! We still couldn't see them, but they were getting close. We hurried down the trail to a spot where we could stand to one side (the trail had a pretty steep dropoff to one side) and then they whizzed past us. The first one held up two fingers to tell us there were two more coming, then the second held up one finger, and the last one told us he was the last. We were glad there wasn't a lot of motorbike traffic. That would have made the hike really hard.
After the hike we drove to Randle to get ice and ice cream bars. Then we went back to camp for a nap. It was a hot afternoon!
Today we got up and packed up our camp and drove back to Seattle. We had a great time with our friends and pretty perfect weather. We sure are looking forward to having showers!
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