Nick, Jean and John headed out for a visit to Mt. St. Helen's. We had been there 6 years ago and were curious about the changes since then. We headed out around 10 or so and drove down to the Johnston Ridge Observatory. It's 7 miles from the north edge of the mountain. They have a wonderful theater presentation of the eruption with a very dramatic ending with the screen moving up and the curtains opening to reveal the mountain as it is today. We hiked up to the top of the viewing area. The lava dome in the middle is growing and last time there was still steam coming out of some of the vents. There is a huge glacier behind the dome (in the middle right).
Of the trees that had been knocked down, many of them have been removed and those standing were further from the eruption zone. There are now small cedar and fir trees growing, some flowers and lots of lichen and mosses growing there now. When we were here before it was mostly barren.
We drove on to the ash hummocks and wandered through them a bit. Alot of new plant growth happening here. The whole Park has seen an incredible recovery rate to everyone's surprise.
We headed back to Nick and Laura's with a couple of stops to pick up fuel and a few things we'd forgotten and then home to a wonderful dinner of salmon - yum!! More good conversation and a little packing up in preparation of our departure tomorrow. What a fun visit we had!!
