While we camping near Portland, we drove to a lava tube called Ape Cave on the south side of Mount St. Helens. It was raining when we got there, but we thought that we would be dry in the cave. We were totally wrong! The cave was dripping wet, and we were soaked! We all walked through the easy part of the cave until Little Kid got cold. Then, Ma and Little Kid headed back to the car while Pa and I went through the hard part of the cave to the other entrance. We had to scramble over huge piles of rocks. One time, we had to climb an eight foot boulder on a tiny “ladder”. Once we finally got out of the cave, we began the long drive back to our campsite.

Because it was dark in the cave, we didn’t get many pictures.

A few days ago, we went to the Columbia River Gorge near Portland, Oregon.  First, we stopped at a very windy overlook.

Then, we went to two waterfalls. I stood under the first one, Latourell Falls, and got soaking wet!

The second waterfall, Multnomah Falls, is the tallest waterfall in Oregon. We took a very steep one mile trail to the top of the 620 foot waterfall.

On May 18, 1980, when I was a few months shy of becoming a teenager, Mount Saint Helens in Washington erupted. Today we went to visit the still active volcano.

We drove up to the Johnston Ridge Observatory, where we had phenomenal views of the crater that was formed by the volcanic eruption. We explored the observatory’s exhibits, watched a film and attended two Park Ranger talks, where we saw great photos and heard the retelling of many first person accounts of May 18.

The impact and power of the volcano is overwhelming.

Another hilight of our Mount Saint Helens stop was a very, very friendly cat roaming around the campground. We did briefly discuss the possibility of adopting her … but decided that four people, a dog and a rabbit were probably enough mammals for our two-hundred square foot home!

Since we had been seeing Mount Rainier, the tallest mountain in Washington, since our stop in Port Townsend, we were excited to see the mountain up close. We stayed near the bottom of the mountain in a beautiful campground. One day, we drove to Paradise, an area that was supposed to have amazing views of Mount Rainier. However, when we got there, Mount Rainier was hidden by clouds, so we decided to hike for awhile. We were hiking along, and then Ma suddenly screamed “Whoa!”. We turned around and saw Mt. Rainier finally coming out of the clouds. It was beautiful. Glaciers snaked down from the snow capped summit, covering the top half of the mountain. Below that, raging glacial melt rivers cascaded down the steep slope. We stared in awe at the mountain for a long time before continuing our hike.

The next day, we returned to try to get another glimpse of the beautiful mountain. We saw it once but then it clouded over and Mount Rainier vanished into the fog.

We spent some time on Bainbridge Island. Our campground was right on Puget Sound, and we could see the twinkling lights of Seattle across the sound. We could also see snow capped Mount Rainier in the distance. Our campsite was right across the street from a playground, and we spent a lot of time playing there.

One day, we took the ferry to Seattle. We had an awesome time exploring Pike’s Market. We went to the gum wall, which is a wall covered with wads of chewed gum at the market. It was disgusting! Then, we wandered around the market for awhile. We went to a sea food stand where whenever a fish was ordered, the clerk and the man standing by the fish would throw the fish that had been ordered back forth. At another sea food stand, they sold octopuses! When we were leaving the market, a statue reached out and touched me! I realized that it was a person dressed up as a statue. Little Kid was a little freaked out, but after about five minutes, he gave the statue knucks.

The next day, we went to the Pacific Science Center in Seattle. It was very cool! There were so many hands on things! I think Little Kid’s favorite was the water shooters and the water table. I don’t have a favorite, but I liked the wheel that you could run inside, like a hamster wheel. We also saw these adorable little animals called naked mole rats. So, so, cute!