BYOL- Lights

Location_Mount St. Helens

Hiking_Ape Cave 5.12.12

Exploring_Olympia, WA
Kayaking_Tugboat Annie's

Lunch_Salami, Pepperoni, Cheese Panini

Dinner_Steak Tacos
Weather_72 degrees, Hot and Sunny


No camping this time.

Let there be light!

Saturday we went to Ape Cave located in the Gifford National forest, south of Mount St. Helens. Ape Cave is the first self-exploration cave that we have been to.  No tour guide, no lights, no hand rails, explore at your own risk.  It was very un-light-ening (its a pun, get it, yippy).   Ape Cave is a lava tube and the ground is made out of magma so it was very uneven and rough, and the upper section we hiked was 1.4 miles.  The cave required a lot of scrambling over the boulders that have fallen from the ceiling.  The cave's ceiling height ranged from 4' to 20' throughout.  Even with our lanterns, it was difficult to see our next steps.  We did not see natural light for almost an hour till we came upon a skylight in the cave.  We emerged from the cave through an opening in the ground. Overall, the caving experience was a-mazing (whaaaat?, another pun, bee boop).  

We also hiked the Trail of Two Forest.  One forest had a ghosts of trees that once stood here. As slow-moving molten lava cooled, it surrounded trees and began to harden. Because of the extreme heat, the trees burned to the ground, leaving hollow trunk-shaped holes in the now firm lava.  We crawled through a fifty foot lava tube that was formed by fallen trees.  It was quite narrow and painful on the knees.

One of my dream vehicle

Sunday, we explored our state capital, Olympia, Washington and went kayaking in the Puget Sound.  We rented our kayaks at Tugboat Annies.  They have a special where you can rent two single kayaks for two hours, with breakfast for $48.00.  Temperature was very warm and the views were picturesque.  We saw multiple cute seals pop their heads up from the water.  We later explored downtown Olympia where they had a farmers market and street vendors.  We found our dream vehicle, Motorcycle Sidecar!