60 in 60, Take 17

#17: Silver Star Mountain, a national forest somewhere in Washington, (06/04/11)

Last Saturday our temperatures finally reached 80 degrees {and then immediately plunged back into the mid-60's...which is fine by me since we, along with many Portlanders, are without AC}. We decided to venture into some new terrain and headed toward what our book calls "the Mt St Helen's area". This is a fairly liberal description. What it means is that we're hiking in Washington, which is the state Mt St Helen's also resides in. It doesn't actually mean we're hiking on, or even beside, Mt St Helen's. Regardless, our hike offered glorious views of Helen, along with every other volcano in the area.

The trailhead for this hike was only 50 miles from our house but it took over three hours to get there {some of that time was spent pulled over on the side of the "road", debating whether or not we wanted to put our car through further torture}. The last ten miles leading to the trailhead are on forest service roads, which are poorly labeled, gravel nightmares, best driven by four-wheel drive, high clearance vehicles...not little blue mazdas. But we made it and were rewarded with views of Mt St Helens...

along with views of Portland {well, it's back there somewhere}

and Mt Hood.

The last third of the trail was still covered in a foot of snow, which Mark absolutely loved. I was gracefully sliding all over the place and could have done well with a pair of snow shoes. Fortunately it wasn't cold outside so even with wet feet, we managed.

A picture of Mt Hood and the Columbia River Gorge {see where the trees just drop off into a giant hole, then rise back up on the other side? That's the Gorge.}

Mt St Helens (left) and Mt Rainier (right). Rainier is huge. Even though it's many miles further away then Helen, it looks practically the same size.

And a "let's sit the camera on the car and take a picture" blooper.

And this was the most beautiful site of the whole trip. It is us, finally making it back to a paved road. I would have easily jumped out of the car and started kissing the pavement had Mark stopped long enough.

So I realized this hike that we may not make it to all 60 in the book, mainly because some just aren't accessible to little cars like ours. And I don't want to spend two hours driving ten miles down a pot-hole ridden mess of a road.