It is a tradition

Ok, we figured it out... Del and I visited Mt. St. Helens the day after his birthday last year. That trip was awesome; we were enchanted by the magnitude of the mountain and the gravity of its history.

We knew we would be back.

After an internship in a place far far away, six crazy months of grad school, and an intense roller-coaster ride we made it back... on Del's birthday-ish again! It has been on our radar all summer; I have the webcam and 7-day weather forecast bookmarked! This weekend turned out to be a good fit for weather and busy hiking schedules.

Turns out that early September is spectacular on the volcano. It was a gorgeous day & perfect for hiking... sunny but not too hot, and (almost) perfectly cloudy.

The plan? hahaha ha.. Thats funny. Like our many other ventures, this hike had a rough idea of places we wanted to go, but ended up following whatever adventure the wind had planned for us. Today's exploration started with a closed road that shouldn't have been closed. Luckily, we had a shiny new Garmin Rhino in hand (thank you Al! you are so awesome) to help us figure out alternative routes. A muddy, boggy, branchy, yet beautiful side trip later we found ourselves back on course for the Fawn Lake Trail.

As I am writing this I am realizing that I have about a hundred stories from the day. Since I aim for brevity but have trouble stopping myself when I am on a roll, I better just wrap things up... so here is the day in a nutshell: headed out EARLYish Saturday, learned that Applebees in Chehalis doesn't open until 10am, couldn't take the road we wanted, found another way (thanks again, Al!), hiked.. a lot, got sidetracked in mud, del almost sunk in quicksandish mud, found the trail, talked to the nice hunter guy who had many maps, took some great pictures, found the "trail" despite not seeing it (um, al, thank you ssoooo much), hiked up and up and up to places I never imagined in my life I could hike to, reached our destination (fawn lake) which turned out to be absolutely amazing (even more so after seeing some pics of what it looked like after the eruption.... see links below), took the nice forest service roads back to the truck (Pinky Vista!), still had enough daylight to explore Coldwater Lake & watched the sun set behind the ridge as we left the park. The day was complete with a trip to Olive Garden in Olympia, because.... it is a tradition.

Now that you now about the day in a nutshell, here are the pics... enjoy.

The Log by Pinky Vista

I am not sure if this was taken at Pinky Vista, but I think that it is the closest Way Point... I love how you can see Mt. St. Helens in the background, and the cloudline covers its current ridge. You can just imagine what the dome must have looked like before the eruption.

Forbidden Flower

Much like my attempts to macro at Rainier, today's macros were challenging due to wind. To get the shot below I held the flower with one hand and hit the shutter release with my other hand. I used my new f1.8 50mm and Canon close up filter.

The Third Plateau

I used an f22 aperture and a circular polarizer for this. There is a long story with this shot, but the basic idea is that at this point in the day I felt very accomplished. It was at this point that I realized I never, ever imagined that I would be able to accomplish the hike we were on. My how my life has changed in recent years.

The Trail, 1 & 2

So, from the third plateau we climbed even higher to reach the Fawn Lake trail. For this set of pictures I tried to use the depth of field tricks that I learned two weeks ago on the Rainier trip. The first pic is how I initially composed the shot, then the bottom one is using the "put your tripod up high then angle the camera down" technique. I also used a circular polarizer and hand-held my cokin 2nd filter.

Wonderment

We did it. We made it the Fawn Lake overlook. I wasn't sure what to expect, and my goodness, the view was breathtaking. I didn't take very many pictures there because I knew I couldn't adequately capture its beauty.(Del can though, and I can't wait to see his pictures!) Both of the pictures below were taken hand held, the first with a polarizer and the second with just a UV filter. I did a little bit of editing at home; the first one was too dark and the bottom one was toooo bright.

I also did a little google search when I came home and found a few pictures of this area following the eruption: one is from the US Geological Service, and the other is from I don't know where. When I saw those pictures I was amazed at the resilience of the area; It is so lush now. One might even say lavish. Note, if you look at that first pic, we were stationed at the top of the ridge. wow!

Coldwater Lake, 1 & 2

A tradition wouldn't be complete without a trip down memory lane. We headed to Coldwater Lake to revisit a few sites from last year's trip. This is kind of a weird place, I can't explain it... must be the altitude. Anyway, the lighting is tricky there, and I spent a lot of time trying to take the first picture. I tried a UV filter, polarizer, 2nd filter, and blue gradient filter. I wanted to capture the rocks on the lake shore AND the peaks in the distance. The pic below is ok... still not what I was imagining, though. Another day then?

There is a trail that runs along the side of the lake. It is quite lovely. We didn't go on it last year, but Del's eagle-eyes spotted it from across the dock this year, so we headed over to explore. I like the way that this pic below turned out.

And, of course, I took some more macro shots. The Coldwater Lake trail is perfect for me for macros because the hillside shelters most of the wind! Unfortunatly, time was quickly zipping away, and I managed only one last macro to wrap up the day.

As always, thanks for looking at my pics! Mt. St. Helens is beautiful, and I am thankful to have had the opportunity to have an adventure...