Sunday, September 29, 2019
We woke up to rain this morning. We decided to visit the museum right across the street from the campground.
There was a seismograph at the museum so the kids jumped up and down to make an earthquake that was then displayed on the screen.
We learned from the ranger there that the weather was supposed to be yucky all day so we changed plans for going back up the Johnson Ridge and hiking and decided to visit the Ape Caves and wander through lava tubes and stay dry. We were not disappointed. This is the longest known lava tube in the continental US.
Come walk with me…
Ape Cave was formed nearly 2000 years ago from lava streaming down the southern flank of Mount St. Helens. As the outer edges cooled into a hardened crust, the inner molten lava was able to drain away before it hardened, leaving behind a tube. After discovering the cave in approximately 1950, a logger told his spelunker friend. That friend explored the cave with his sons and their friends, who called themselves the Mount St. Helens Apes. Thus the name of the cave. From https://www.wta.org/go-hiking/hikes/ape-cave
In we go…
We all did the short cave. A couple hours of walking.
It’s a constant 42* in the tubes.
Jeremiah found a hole to back in to.
Jeshuah and Jeremiah wanted to do the long cave as fast as they could so the three younger kids and Suzie waited in the car and Donald hiked the trail to where the caves exits in the woods to meet the boys when they were finished. They did the cave in less than an hour!