I truly think I might be my own worst enemy. I do this to myself and I can't explain why. There is something that happens to me when I hit a trail and suddenly feel that I am half my age. After spending a day acting like I am in my mid-20's I always know I will suffer for it. Is it worth it? Yes, I think it must be, because I am clearly an addict and cannot stop. But this time I was so wiped out that I almost crawled into bed with some hunters at the end of my hike! Then I suffered a 2 day migraine as my final punishment.
After having spent so many weeks up on Mount Adams recently and knowing that snow was surely soon bearing down on us, I was feeling called to go visit another volcano this week before it was too late. Mt. St. Helens had been calling me back to her. In September, I had found a new favorite spot on her. Today, however, I was being called to an old favorite spot. That being said, we were going to attempt a new approach connecting several trail systems together for what I felt would be an epic loop. It was epic....but mostly in route finding. I was not expecting it to be so difficult! After I got back from the hike, I actually did a little more research on this and the only people I could find writing about some of the sections I did stated that it should never be attempted without GPS. After what I went through, I have to agree. Although, perseverance, intuition and birds sent by God got me through it.
So the beginning of the trail was easy. After a couple of miles however, the easy to follow trail dumped out onto a giant lahar. (A lahar is an old mud and debris flow full of boulders, rocks, sand, ash and mud. As you can imagine, Mt. St. Helens has a lot of these!) Unless someone has spent a lot of time moving rocks, the trail will disappear on a lahar. Every time winter snows melt and rivers flow down the lahar once again, the rocks will all be moved wiping out any sign of trail. But I have done these crossings many times before and thought no problem. A little bouldering, a little route finding.....no big deal. Most of the time the trail will just cross straight across the lahar and pick up on the opposite side, or darn close to it. Well the first lahar crossing was fairly easy. We moved across and up the lahar a few hundred feet and were able to find cairns (stacks of rocks) and some faded red ribbon to mark the way. There was one dicey section through some brush that I thought was wrong, but we made it through just fine. I was congratulating myself for figuring the puzzle out and ready to hit trail again, when after passing through more brush, we found ourselves dumped out onto an even larger lahar. This one felt about a quarter mile wide in places and went on for miles. We were staring up at the face of Helens while the sun was beating down on us. The irony was not lost on me that here I was standing in a tank top and shorts this week when last week I had 5 layers on and was near freezing in a snow storm.
My hope was that if I walked directly across this lahar, that I would simply find the trail on the other side. That was not the case and I could tell the trail did not go that way. I searched and searched for cairns as far as my eyes could see. Was that one? It was so hard to tell here as so many rocks had flowed on top of other rocks. So I constantly questioned if a rock formation was man-made to mark trail or just nature made by the last water flows through here. I always pride myself on helping to build cairns in places like this to help other hikers who come behind me, but since I was not sure where I was I couldn't add to any rock piles. I moved to the center of the flows and walked up the middle toward the mountain, constantly watching the treeline on the other side for any sign of trail. I scanned the ground for tracks. I looked right and left for cairns or any sign indicating where the trail should be. There was no longer any ribbon like I was occasionally finding on the first lahar. There were no longer boot prints to be found. It was as if the trail was literally swallowed up and gone. A normal person would admit that by definition, they were lost. I however, knew where I was. I was on a mountain. So I was not lost.
I could feel frustration growing as I double backed to the last known section of trail to try again and again to see if I could spot anything I might have missed. Nothing. We climbed in and out of the mini ravines making up the debris flows, stopping and scanning for cairns, ribbons, anything. But there was still nothing. I was wasting time searching. I started to make contingency plans for the rest of my day if I couldn't figure this out. There was another trail system I could double back and do instead. But I was determined to keep trying this for some time. Surely we could find this trail! We crossed all the way to the other side several times and found the forest deeply choked with underbrush. There was no sign of a trail anywhere. But then I spotted a giant boot print. Either Bigfoot had taken to wearing boots or a man with probably size 16 boots had been lost here too. I could see his tracks petering out and meandering around as lost as I was. Strangely this was very comforting to me. This man had done the same thing I was doing. It encouraged me to keep going forward. He was going from the far side to the center and back, like I was doing. Ever searching. But then his tracks just stopped. It was as if he disappeared too. I figured he must have given up and turned around on the rocks to go back. "Why my friend?" I silently said to him wishing he was still hiking with me.
As I continued up the lahar, I started to pray for God to give me a sign to show me the way. I didn't want to fail in my goal today and needed help to find the right path. "Light the path at my feet Father!" I silently called up to Heaven. Just then 2 ravens flew right over the top of me calling loudly. They moved up the center of the lahar and seemed to be telling me to follow them. I did and moved to the center of the rockflow as they beckoned, continuing toward the mountain. As I looked back to try to see where we had come from, I realized with a sinking heart that we had hiked about a half mile up the debris flow and I would have a hard time even finding the connector path back now if I wanted to. Realistically I knew it was about impossible that a trail would just go up a lahar for a half mile before turning into the woods. That would be really unusual. But as I followed my raven friends, I suddenly saw a rock cairn. It was just 3 stones on a boulder, so not very large, but I knew it was man made. I could just feel it. I walked up to stand next to the cairn hoping for another clue. Can you spot the cairn here on the boulder in the center of this photo? I wanted to sing and dance just finding this. Someone marked this spot deliberately.
As I stood by the cairn and scanned the treeline on the opposite side, my breath caught when I saw the ever so faint flutter of an old tattered red ribbon tied to a tree branch. I took off my sunglasses and rubbed my eyes and looked again. Was I imagining that? Nope that was indeed a ribbon!!! Thank God I have great distance vision! I was fully rejoicing now and added many rocks to the small cairn to mark this location! Can you see the ribbon marking the trail in the treeline here?? It was because the wind caught it that drew my attention. "Thank you God!"
Sadly I knew this half mile of route finding up the lahar had cost me a solid hour of time. So I quickened our pace. We still had a lot of unknown trail ahead of us. I had only seen a simple sketch of this trail on a hand drawn map, but had no real information. I didn't know the distance I would be covering to make it to the other trail system I knew. I didn't know what the elevation would do. I didn't really know anything about its twists and turns or landmarks. It was all going to be a mystery for me to solve as I hiked. I learned that the trail would climb steeply, then dump me down the backside of a ridge, only to climb again. It switch-backed through trees, then reached open plateaus with young growth and mushrooms enough to be a jackpot to any fungus hunter! At times the trail was clearly on an old overgrown roadbed. It changed constantly and I enjoyed unpacking the mystery one step at a time.
When the trail t-boned another path, I looked to my left and right. This is not what I had expected. I thought this trail would run into one I knew and could recognize immediately. But I did not know this place and there was no way to know if I should go left or right. I turned right immediately on instinct, but after a few hundred feet, started to second guess myself. After thinking too much, I turned around and went back to go the other way. We hiked about a half mile, before I knew it was wrong and I needed to back track to the junction. I can't say exactly what it was that felt so wrong as the trail I was on clearly continued before me. But I just knew it was not right. I could feel it in my bones. I turned around and went the half mile back to go the way I initially felt I should go before I allowed my brain to take over. I knew I was losing more precious time for my loop hike, but I also had faith that my delays were probably God aligning my timing to be in the perfect place for sunset. I have long since learned to trust His timing on the trail.
We continued on for miles and I was just starting to think I had really screwed this up, when I finally hit another t-bone junction. This one had a sign that I recognized! Ah-ha!! I had made it to the trail I had hoped to find! We turned right and flew up the path. I had only ever done this trail once before, about three years ago. It had been a hot summer day then and it was just Nova and I. The funny thing is that I remembered all the breaks we had to take to climb it on that day. As we flew past these locations I would point them out to Nova....."Remember, we took a break right there.....and there." I don't know why I remembered our break locations so well, but my memory told me that it was a hard hike for us then and I felt like I was dying during those breaks. This time, we were virtually running uphill and not needing to stop at all. How much our bodies and stamina had changed I thought. I felt strong and indestructible as we flew up the steep terrain to eventually connect to the Loowit Trail. The Loowit is the trail that circumnavigates Mt. St. Helens. I am slowly section hiking that trail I suppose. Just a few more sections to go to fully complete it! Before long, the Loowit took me to that old favorite view point on this side of the mountain. I call this my "Sneaky Side" of the mountain. The girls couldn't take their eyes off the mountain goats though!
The Fall colors were popping in this ravine just like I had hoped they would be. As it was growing late in the day, the sun seemed to just really put on a show for us. I could feel God watching us as we traversed the ravine just above the alpine tree line. In fact, He sent me a burning bush just like he did for Moses. Even Nova was impressed and took a selfie with the bush!
Across the ravine and up the opposite ridge, we enjoyed hiking a gorgeous section of trail, lined with tucked away campsites that looked immensely inviting. Since it would be in the 40's overnight, I had not brought my camping gear with me, thinking it best to just do a Fall dayhike. The sun was getting lower in the sky to our left while the peak of the mountain smiled down upon us to our right. My memory told me that a very special boulder was coming up on the trail with truly astounding views. The one other time I had stood there, the skies had been full of wild fire smoke. But not today. I had clear blue skies today and couldn't wait to see the views from the rock. The plan was to eat our supper on the rock and it looked like our timing would be perfect for sunset on the stone!
As I got the food out to eat, I had to open some packages that wrinkled a lot. As a person very sensitive to sound pollution myself, I hated to make that noise even outside. We had not seen a single person today at all, but I laughed out-loud when I looked up and saw two of our mountain goat friends just glaring at us for the noise we were making. "Sorry Guys!" I yelled over to them. "I can't get this bag open!" They went back to grazing as soon as I stopped my wrinkling.
But then I caught Mt. Adams glaring at me. "Please don't be jealous," I said to him. "I have been spending a lot of time with you lately." I could feel him still looking at me over the Goat Rocks and Sunrise Peak. I could see all my mountain friends from the giant boulder viewpoint as we watched the sun set and ate our snacks.
As much as I hated to admit it, I knew we needed to get moving. I calculated that we had about 7-9 more miles to hike out. That meant night hiking, especially when we dropped below treeline and the forest would choke out all light from the sky. Most of the trail would be downhill, but there was still a couple miles where we would be climbing. Since it was about 6pm now, I decided to put my long pants and one of my coats on from my pack.
The sunset hiking was so beautiful that I tarried and took photos as we went. But once it became too dark for that, I stashed my camera back in its holster for good and we started to run. I wanted to cover as much ground as possible before it became too dark to see. I was shocked when total blackness just seemed to settle on us like a blanket. One minute I could see fine and the next it was the blackest of nights. Unfortunately this occurred just as I crossed a river on a log. We got across and then realized there was no trail on the steep bank along the other side. It had been swallowed up by the night! I pulled out my flashlight and pointed the beam in all directions. There was just no trail. Two rivers converged right here so I had water on two sides. We moved through the trees and thick underbrush searching for any sign of trail in the beam of light piercing the darkness. I felt that I was on a game trail as I climbed over some logs and searched for anything helpful. We back tracked to the river again and tried it over and over. No luck.
I had a sinking feeling that if we couldn't find the trail, we might have to wait until morning light. Since I did not have any overnight gear with me, this was not a welcome thought, especially down in this gully chocked in underbrush with two rivers making most of the ground wet. We retreated back down to the river once more to find the log we had crossed. That was 100% trail. I could see that. I just had to figure out what the trail did from there. Then I finally saw it. The trail paralleled up the river literally in the water about 6 more feet past the log we had crossed (yes, we had to get our feet and pants wet), before back crossing the river once more on another log and then taking up again on the same side I started out on, but above the convergence of the two river systems. "Tricky, tricky" I told the trail. Who would have guessed that there was a "S" curve across logs on the river I thought to myself! Once my boots were on solid trail once more, I took a deep breath and hoped that was the last of the route finding for one day! Especially in the dark!
The rest of the way out, we half walked and half ran. By the last couple of miles I became aware that my everything was hurting. My toes and even toenails hurt all the way up to my head which was clearly starting a migraine. I knew I had not been drinking enough. My normally good right knee was on fire and I debated taking my knee brace off my bad left knee to share, but didn't want to take the time. I just tried to hike without bending the right knee, leading to a funny hobbled run. There was pain in my hips and back. Every cell in my body wanted to die. But as I turned off my flashlight and stared up at the night sky full of so many stars before getting to the trailhead, I knew it was worth it. As I thought about the views during sunset, I knew it was worth it. I tried to figure out why I was so tired as I made the final half mile traverse to my truck. I knew the route finding had slowed me down and taken a toll. I knew it was that time of the month for me, but didn't think that was fully it. It was when I checked my pedometer, that I had my answer. This was surely a speed record hike! I had just completed 18 miles in 6 hours. But I knew that since I had lost a solid 2 hours in just back tracking and route finding, that meant I really had hiked 18 miles in about 4 hours of actual hike time. This was not a flat 18 miles either. There was a lot of elevation gain on this hike! My jaw hung open at the realization of what I had pushed. I clearly still hiked like I was 25 years old and not almost 50! Now I was paying for that and would for days!
As I walked off the trail, there was a huge hunters camp set up right near my truck. I virtually had to walk right through their camp as I came off the trail. The girls had their purple and red night lights on as we moved past them trying to be quiet. The hunters had taken tarps and created a giant circus sized tent larger than my first home. They had a huge fire pit set up and even a porch tarp erected. There were several men standing around drinking and listening to music played from the open door of one of their pickup trucks. They all stared at us speechless as we moved out of the darkness and into their circle of light. They had probably been watching our lights moving toward them for some time. I could see the surprise on their faces. First that we were hiking at night, and then second that I was a woman alone. But I was so bone tired and in so much pain that the 2 1/2 hour drive home seemed impossible. I came real, real close to telling them to move over and make room in their tarp house as I was going to spend the night with them! But in the end, I opened my thermos of hot cocoa waiting in my truck and changed out of my boots. I decided not to strip down and change my clothes in front of the men staring at me in the light pouring from my own open truck doors and just drove home in my hiking clothes. I might be my own worst enemy, but I am not that stupid! Not one word passed between them and us, but they sure watched us closely, which made the wolf very nervous.
In case you are still wondering if sunset hiking is really worth all of this, I will share these final photos so you can make up your own mind.
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