The most challenging hike that I have done in my life so far.
I could get too optimistic or ambitious at times. So when I saw a college friend posts about his climbing experience summitting Mt. Rainier in 2018, I was hooked! After chatting with another college friend in Chicago who’s into hiking and long distance running, we decided we want to do the climb in the following year. Obviously this post is not about climbing Mt. Rainier… Pretty quickly, we realized that none of us was ready for the 14,411′ ft overnight climb with ice axes anytime soon. So when my good friend in Portland proposed to climb Mt. Saint Helens, I immediately go on board, thinking that this is a reasonable & realistic compromise to my over-achieving goal.
Mount Saint Helens is an iconic volcano in the Pacific North West, also one of the hardest hike with little to none climbing skill requirement. On the 10th of August in 2019, a fellowship – 10 of us, including the college friend in Chicago, his girlfriend, our mutual friend in Seattle, my Portland friends, my partner and I set off to conquer our most memorable hike of the year.
The first two miles was easy, just like most hikes in the area with lush trees and well maintained trails. Once it’s passed the permit-only point, it quickly transitioned to a 2500 vertical feet of boulder fields. Although mentally prepared, I could not hide the excitement of trying out “real world rock climbing” for the first time. These boulders are covered by volcanic dusts and sharp rock pieces and would cut through one’s skin easily. This is why a pair of thick gardening gloves is on the packing list.
Before we know it, we were way above the tree lines. Soon enough, the clouds swallowed us completely and left us with about 15′ visibility. If climbing the boulders in broad sunlight was an easy introduction to mountain climbing, climbing these boulders in poor visibility in the cloud definitely made my legs tremble and my heart beats faster. We were racing with the weather and got caught in the fog/rain/mist again on the way down over these boulders. The fellowship was led by a scout, my partner, and the rest of us followed and pointed direction for each other by playing Marco Polo the entire time.
The next and hardest stretch is described by many as “two steps forward and one step back.” No joke – it’s exactly like that. This last 1000 vertical feet is full of ash and small rocks, all the way to the top of the volcano rim. Luckily by then, the weather has cleared up, and we were out of the stressful cloud/fog/rain situation. We took a snack break before the last stretch and got to enjoy the view for some time. But my honest feeling when seeing the peak and trail ahead of me, after already exhausted from climbing in poor visibility? PRETTY DAUNTING! Oh well, it’s not like that I have any other choice.
After another gruesome hour of leg workout, there were are, on top of the mountain that I can see from my home everyday. I got to look into the heart of a volcano caldera for the first time and quite frankly, although it’s absolutely unique, it’s not as exciting as I imagined (I really shouldn’t be imagining flaming lava either.) By then, my mind was filled with that pure joy of achieving a hard task, and I swallowed my victory PBJ sitting on the edge of the rim like a wolf starved for days. Worrying about the rain coming soon, we ended our break on top quickly and started heading down the elevation that we climbed. A few hours later – exhausted, sun burnt, worried that we were lost on the way down, we made it to the trail head and had a sip of celebratory champagne.
10/10 would do it again.