Blown away: The beauty of Mt Rainier and the power of Mt St. Helens

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Wow. German first, English below...

Wie ihr am Titel sehen koennt, will Donika ein bisschen spannender (und nicht nur einfach VIEL) schreiben. Nun gut, die Quantitaet meiner Beitraege muessten sich noch um Einiges bessern.
Nachdem wir nun ein paar Tage in Seattle verbracht und die Stadt lieben gelernt haben, haben wir uns ein Auto ausgeliehen. Ein kleines Auto (Chevrolet Aveo) und so dachte ich Narr, es wuerde wenig Sprit verbrauchen, aber in den USA scheint ein Autopilot, Automatikschaltung, Armstuetze ... unabdingbar zu sein und ein Verbrauch von 9l/100km als wenig zu gelten.
Egal. Zuerst sind wir Richtung Mt Rainier (ein Vulkan ca. 100km suedoestlich von Seattle) gefahren. Unser erster Tag dort war super. Die meisten Dinge koennten wir nicht sehen, da der Nebel extrem stark war und unsere enorme Wanderung hat sich als fies herausgestellt, es war stuermisch wie sau und es hat dann spaeter auch angefangen zu nieseln. Nass, kalt und mit wenig Fotos haben wir uns dann im Hotel am Kamin gewaermt, ehe wir uns dann wieder in unser Zelt verkrochen haben. Doch welch Ueberraschung, am naechsten Tag war es sonnig und wir sind wieder an den Berg rangefahren. Ich haette nicht gedacht, dass man so von den Socken geworfen werden kann, doch dort, wo gestern noch eine dicke Nebelwand stand, erstreckt sich heute ein Berg. Ein umwerfend schoener und faszinierender Berg. Ausserdem hat Donika auch endlich den lang ersehnten Baeren gesehen - eigentlich mit blossem Auge nur ein schwarzer Punkt am Berghang. Hurra. Einen zweiten Baeren haetten wir fast auch noch zu sehen bekommen, doch da viele Leute in der Naehe waren und er seine Mutter suchte, hat er uns nur seinen Arsch gezeigt und hat sich in die Buesche verschlagen.
Dann am Nachmittag haben wir die Gegend verlassen und uns in Richtung Mt. St. Helens aufgemacht. Schweissgetraenkt (der Tank war fast leer und ich hatte die Reichweite des Autos leicht ueberschaetzt bzw. war so dumm, nicht darauf zu achten, dass sich in der ehemals vom Vulkan etwas zerlederten Landschaft fuer 90km keine Tankstelle finden lassen wuerde) sind wir dann am Zeltplatz angekommen und haben es sogar zur Tankstelle geschafft (kein Schieben - hurra). Am naechsten Morgen sind wir dann in aller Fruehe an den Vulkan rangefahren. Zwischendurch haben wir in den vielen Besucherzentren gehalten, Bilder gesehen, Videos gesehen und - besonders ruehrend - Berichte von Augenzeugen gehoert. Uns stockte der Atem fuer fast die ganze Zeit und noch immer sind wir stark beruehrt. Waere Mt St Helens am 18.Mai 1980 nicht schon um 8.30 ausgebrochen, haette er viele tausend Menschen getoetet, denn der urspruengliche Plan sah vor, die Evakuierung auszusetzen und die Menschen fuer einen Tag wieder (wie am Vortag) in ihre Haeuser zu lassen, um ihr Hab und Gut aus der Gefahrenzone zu schaffen. Wahnsinn, denn die Explosion des Vulkans hat um Umkreis von 20km alles mit Temperaturen von ca. 500 Grad Celsius verbrannt, dann das Tal unter hunderten von Metern Geroell begraben und das Ganze dann mit 1m Asche bedeckt. Verrueckt und faszinierend.

Mehr und v.a. Positives gibt es dann bald aus Costa Rica.

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Wow again.
As you can tell from the title, we were completely blown away by our visits to these two mountains, which are two of the many thousands of volcanoes making up the Pacific Ring of Fire. After the few days we spent in sunny (apparently very rare) Seattle, we managed to acquire a tent and set off for some more camping. We hired a car as it is impossible to get to these mountains by public transport. The US is indeed a car-loving country and here, the stereotypes of huge vehicles really do ring true! However, lots of 'our' other stereotypes about americans and their attitudes to environment and politics have been put into question - which is really good 😊 We hired the smallest car we could get, stupidly thinking it would be nice and fuel efficient (a white Chevrolet Aveo) but it seems that Auto Pilot controls, Automatic gearboxes, arm rests and such are absolute essentials and we found ourselves refilling the tank much more than we had hoped to! Oh well.

Firstly, we headed for Mount Rainier- the volcano visible from the Seattle skyline about 100km southeast of the city.

- - Class 4/5 P at Purley Oaks, I hope you little monsters are keeping track of all this on Mrs Peters' map! I will be checking when I see you in December! 😉 - -

Our first day at Mt Rainier could have been much better! Due to heavy fog, we could barely see the hillsides right in front of us, let alone the mountain high up in the sky somewhere! Viewpoints marked 'Glacier Vista' and 'Panorama Point' meant nothing as we we climbed and sweated our way up the trails, only to see a white mass of...fog, fog and more fog. Our 4 hr hike ended in us returning to the car park, cold, exhausted and above all, soaking wet right down to our underwear! It had got stormier and windier higher up and the light drizzle at the start of the hike had later turned into full-on rainfall. As you can imagine, Christian was v disappointed with today's 'photo-output', as was I. We couldn't stand exposing our fingers to the chilling wind and rain! And not only did we not seen the mountain itself...we still didn't see any bears either! We'll be in Central America soon so are running out of time. 4 weeks of searching and still nothing. 😞

The gods must have been smiling down on us in some way however, as when we finally got back to the car park, we decided to go and have a nosy in the posh hotel the 'Paradise Inn'. We were greeted by a huge reception room, adorned with high ceilings and wooden beams toped off with two huge, glowing fireplaces at either end of the hall! Heaven. Therefore, we were able to join a group of other wet and worn hikers by the fire until we dried out. This took several hours. Luckily, the the hotel seemed to have an open-door policy with a cofee shop and gift shops around so we didn't feel too guilty hanging our sodden gloves, scarves and raincoats up around the hearth and hanging around as long as necessary. Returning to our campsite wet, was not part of the plan and would not have been fun!

What a contrast the next day was! You wouldn't think it possible but the next day, when set off again, the skies were clear, the sun was out and it was pleasntly warm. As we went around a bend in the road, out of the blue there popped up a huge, magnificent mountain standing proudly complete with sun reflecting on the snow-topped peaks. It really hadn't been 'there' the day before. We hadn't even been able to see it's outline! Hiking on the trails today, was a lot more fun and we had some fun with the pics.

Then came the highlight of the day....we finally saw a bear! Admittedly it was far off in the distance on a hill-side (which is clearly much better safety-wise!) but with binoculars we could watch with leisure as it gorged itself on berries preparing for winter and moved around in the bushes. Was a cool sight. Soon after that, we just missed a second sighting. This time it was a bear cub, which dashed off into the bushes when it saw the hikers just ahead of us- we caught sight of it's bottom as it disappeared to find mama.

In the afternoon, we left Mt Rainier and drove down towards Mount St Helens national park. We finally arrived that evening covered in sweat from a stressful journey with lots of crossed fingers. We had nearly run out of petrol! Naively, we hadn't realised how large the distances between the petrol stations would be (90km with nothing!) and had underestimated it so much that we ended up driving 'on empty' for a good half hour at least! Thank god the car had a large reserve tank otherwise we would have been pushing the car to the camp site! Either that or hitching a lift to the nearest petrol station and back again. Phew.

The next morning, we headed towards the Mt St. Helens itself. On the way, we stopped off at several visitor information centres where we learned more about the eruption, the predictions, monitoring, aftermath etc. We saw lots of models, films and listened to moving, real eye-witness accounts from rangers and locals who were there at the time. We spent the majority of the day experiencing a roller coaster of emotions from awe and fascination to sadness and sorrow. Fascination though the whole time. It was tragic..but it was also 'just' nature, doing it's thing in the cycle that its always happened. What really grabbed me were the before/after shots of the mountain. Pre-eruption, it was just like Mt Rainier, upon which we had hiked less than 24hrs ago. It too, was once covered in forests, snow and lakes with thousands of visitors. Now it looks like a crater resembling a moon landscape. And thats a whole 28 years later! We were amazed. And moved. And still are.

Mt St Helens erupted at 8.30 am on 18th May 1980. Had it happened just 30mins later, thousands of people would have been killed as the original plan had been to 'cease' the evacuation for the day in order to allow residents back into their homes to save some of their possessions (as lots had done the day before) All these people would have lost their lives in an instant. Madness. What luck! The eruption torched everything in its path at temperatures of more than 500 degrees celcius in an area 20km around the volcano. The valley was buried uder hundreds of metres of rubble and the whole area was covered in a metre of ash. No more trees, plants, houses, animals, roads - nothing. Mad. Fascinating. All around, there were hundred of white trees, lying on the ground which had been blown down by the blast-huge forests which had been hundreds of yrs old wiped out in a matter of seconds. Hard to comprehend.

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Photos

DoniEuleOwl
Enjoying the views...?!

cheeky Marmot
not a bear :( but a funny little creature all the same
kein Baer :( aber lustig!

Mt Rainier3
the next day / am naechsten Tag

Donis Kunstfoto
me (D) being 'arty'

Mt St Helens2
The crater. A new lava dome is growing inside.

Mt St Helens5
see the little white lines - these are blown down trees, burnt and toppled like match sticks.
weisse Linien = verbrannte, gekoepfte/umgeknickte Baeume