Mount St. Helens
Jeremy and I teamed up on this trip that was initially planned for April (before permits are required), but we rescheduled twice due to weather. Finally our schedules and the weather aligned on a Saturday in early May. We met at the trailhead parking lot on Friday night in order to get an early AM start. When I rolled in, Jeremy was already set up with his camp chairs under his vehicle awning, enjoying the trailhead in style. We talked for a while before retreating to our respective vehicles for some attempted sleep.
This was my first night using a new mattress in my Jeep and I was looking forward to (hopefully) a night of relative comfort. I also blocked out the windows with some window shades, hoping to avoid the distraction of the constant parade of vehicles arriving throughout the night. With a sleeping bag and a pillow, it was actually quite comfortable and I slept well.
We woke up early, had some breakfast and started up the trail at 5 AM. There were already a lot of people hiking, many with skis strapped to their backs. With the relative lack of snow this year, we didn't encounter good coverage until well above Chocolate Falls. The skiers had to lug their skis beyond this point before they could begin their uphill travel. We encountered two guys higher up on the Worm Flows who had abandoned their skis due to the super low coverage. As my friend Mike texted me that day, "Epic low snow year!"
At the USGS weather station (~5,700 feet), we finally encountered continuous snow and put on crampons. After this, we found the snow fairly supportive and there were good steps already kicked in. The rest of the climb was a combination of uphill struggle punctuated by much-needed recovery breaks.
We eventually topped out at the crater rim where a bunch of groups were hanging out and eating their lunch. A large group of skiers was celebrating some birthdays and were all decked out in bright colors and skirts. We found a spot past them on climbers left and had our lunch. I brought a couple of pieces of pizza, confirming the theory that in the mountains, nothing tastes better.
We decided to forgo the trip over to the true summit and just hang out for a bit, enjoying the views. At one point, I casually glanced over to my left to see a female from the larger party squatting down to do some business, so I quickly looked away, wanting to give her a little bit of privacy in that exposed place.
After lunch, we decided to head down and since there were some established glissade routes, we put on our rain pants and took advantage of them. Unfortunately, one of the tracks took us too far to skiers right onto Monitor Ridge, but we didn't initially realize this. We came to the bottom of one of the tracks where a woman asked us if she had seen one of her hiking shoes that she had apparently lost higher up on the track. No, we hadn't seen them, we said, and we moved on.
As we tracked further down Monitor Ridge to skier's right, we realized that we were off route, but getting back on route would require a steep traverse across a gully that would entail some slide risk, so we kept tracking down the ridge. The top of St. Helens, or any mountain for that matter, is tricky in that starting a few degrees off course can land you very wide of your target. I've had this exact issue previously on St. Helens, so I wasn't too worried that we would eventually find our way back. After a while, we realized the lost shoe woman was following us. When she caught up with us, we were blamed for getting her off route because she was following us and thought we knew where we were going. No longer in need of our guide service, she charged on ahead.
We found our way back over to the climbing route, joining it on the slope above the weather station. Several kids were there yelling at someone up the mountain they seemed to have lost.
The rest of the trip down was notable for the unseasonably high temperatures, Jeremy running a little low on water and foot blisters caused by his unforgiving mountaineering boots. The last section through the woods always feels long and my brain begins to see the parking lot where it does not exist. Finally the real parking lot appeared, and we were out.
Equipment: crampons, ice axe, poles
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