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Friday was largely a travel day from La Conner down to Trout Lake, WA via Mt. St. Helens. It’s hard to describe seeing Mt. St. Helens even after having been there. The enormity of the destruction is incredible. I remember when the mountain erupted in 1980 from stories on the news and have since seen enough shows on PBS, etc to know what happened, but all the pictures and stories couldn’t really convey the magnitude of the event. The two photos are from the Johnson Ridge observatory on the north side of the mountain. This is the direction of the main blast. The first photo is of the mountain itself and the surrounding blast area. The second photo is zoomed in on the cones in the crater which are still growing and rumbling. You can just barely see some of the steam with the naked eye/camera from the currently active area.

After leaving Mt. St. Helens we got back on I-5, drove to Portland, and headed east on I-84 which is a beautiful drive up the Columbia River Gorge. We crossed the river at Hood River where the Gorge Games are in progress. Mike and Corinne live on 60 acres of land that includes a tree farm. We had a tasty dinner, played some games, and got to do our laundry from this week which was very necessary.

To say they have a spectacular view is an understatement. This picture of Mt. Adams is taken from a chair in their lofted great room as I’m writing this post. The haze is actually a forest fire on the next mountain over, but I don’t think it spoiled the view too much.