Monday seemed like a good day to head south and deep into the ground. People have been mentioning the Ape Caves to me since we moved here. They had us at "caves". So we packed up the van for the 2.5 hour drive and headed down to the south side of Mt St Helens with our partners in crime. The caves were lava tubes that are not normally found near a volcano like Mt St Helens (should I be worried?) and supposedly a 0.75 mile hike. We gathered up all the headlamps and flashlights we had in the house and then some sweatshirts and jackets and we were ready to go!
A pic of most of the crew at the mouth of the cave.
Everyone situated and ready to go. Isaac kept saying he wanted to walk (I had the backpack carrier), but....
Rock face
Cool glittery, shiny, gold rock
Cool hole in the wall
My camera struggled to take pictures in the dark, but I did get this one shot down the tunnel.
The meatball
Isaac's ride on the way in. (I was his ride on the way out.) He didn't cry or get visibly upset, but he didn't look particularly happy to be in the caves either.
Jason kept finding neat holes in the cave walls. I was impressed since it was pretty much all I could do to keep my light on the ground and keep myself from breaking my ankles on the rough floor.
Eventually the ceiling got lower and lower. Then it became uncomfortable to stand. Then uncomfortable to kneel. Then you had to wiggle on your belly to reach the end. I only made it to the kneeling stage, but this kid went all the way to the end.
The three explorers
Isaac and his preferred method of transportation.
Waaaaaayyyyy back there is the very end of the cave. Gives me a little bit of anxiety even thinking about being down in there.
Family pic
Then we booked it out because some of us really, really had to pee (no, it wasn't me this time) and there were absolutely no options for that the cave. And then it was time for lunch.
No, Josh didn't eat that rock. He does like that kind of picture though. We had lunch at the trail head and then hiked the Trail of Two Forests. One forest is the living forest and the other is imprint of a forest that was covered in lava flows 1900 years ago. Pretty cool science stuff.
Picture of the Miller males - I cannot get a nice one of everyone to save my life. But they're still cute.
A picture of both forests.
There was a little tunnel here for the kids to crawl through. It was a great hit.
Josh decided that if he was any bigger he wouldn't have fit. Being almost 5'5" makes him feel too big for things apparently.
Michael and Ben went through multiple times.
And Isaac was a very interested bystander.
Then we packed it all up and braced ourselves for the drive home in holiday traffic. But before we had to deal with all of that, we took a moment to stop at this gorgeous overlook and enjoy what Washington State has to offer above ground.
