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Fun Ahead: Return of the Great American Road Trip
The Volcano Tour
Roaming the Northwest's fiery mountains

By John Brant


	Assuage that red-hot wanderlust: Washington's Mt. St. Helens (D. Falconer/PhotoLink)

MY FAMILY LIVES IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST, a region forged by fire. The course of our rivers, the yield of our soil, and the thrust of our mountains are all the products of past eruptions—prehistoric, ancient, and modern—from the volcanic peaks forming the Cascades. Living under the shadow of this phenomenon, we tend to take it for granted. So we toured among the range's flagship massifs, considering them both close-up and from a clarifying distance. We started with Mount St. Helens in Washington State, traveled through the Columbia River Gorge to Mount Hood, and drove down to Mount Bachelor in central Oregon: 300 volcano-graced miles.

Day 1>>Portland, Oregon-Kelso, Washington
Ahead lies Mount St. Helens, the peak cloud-hidden from I-5. We pull off the freeway at Castle Rock, get our bearings at the National Volcanic Monument Visitor Center, and then work our way up Washington 504. My wife, Patricia, and I first drove this way when our son, Tom, was six, our daughter, Mary, was three, and the mountain was still a sere, cinder-black wasteland. Now Tom is 13, Mary is 10, and St. Helens has undergone a remarkable rebirth.

The Volcano Tour: The Details

To get the goods on the mileage, directions, stops, and stays of The Volcano Tour CLICK HERE.

At the Coldwater Ridge Visitor Center, hillsides bloom with heather, and huckleberry bushes soften the lava shoals. We visit Johnston Ridge Observatory for a 16-minute film spotlighting the eruption. Afterward, curtains draw back to reveal a picture window and what ought to be a view into the crater, four miles away. Today, however, all we see is gray. Undaunted, we climb the Eruption Trail, which leads to the highest observation point along Johnston Ridge. At the top, we spend ten cold but exhilarating minutes identifying neighboring mountains that Tom and Mary, who've grown up in the Northwest, know by heart. Patricia and I, California transplants, still have to go by the map.

Doubling back on I-5, we stop in Kelso and economize at the Comfort Inn, knowing we'll have plush accommodations later.

Day 2>> Kelso-Stevenson
We leave I-5 in Woodland, where Washington 503 takes us east along the southern slope of St. Helens. A few miles from the crater, we stop at Ape Cave, a 3.25-mile lava tube tucked into the mountainside. We put on fleece, grab four flashlights, and proceed underground into the black heart of the volcano. We wind our way through the narrow cavern before emerging into the sweet, pure light of the High Cascades.

"Guess we can't get any closer to a mountain than that," Tom says with satisfaction as we climb into the car.

We overnight at Dolce Skamania Lodge, where Patricia and I soak in the hot tub, gazing into the Columbia Gorge, while the kids play in the pool. We have dinner on the patio—the sun warming our faces, local microbrews in our glasses, the kids goofing on the lawn as the salmon grills.

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