If you have extra time while visiting Seattle or Portland during the summer or fall, I recommend doing a day trip to Mount St. Helens!
Mount St. Helens is an active stratovolcano and erupted 40 years ago, on May 18, 1980, spewing ash into the air for 9 hours. It was the deadliest eruption in US history, killing 57 people and thousands of animals. The Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument was established by Congress in 1982 and the US Forest Service has created a lovely recreational area. It took me 20 years to visit, and I think it may be the most under-rated place in the state! Add it to your bucket list ASAP!
There are three main sides of the park, the West side, East side, and South side. Since the area is mainly forest, there aren’t many roads, so it takes a long time to get from one side to the other. For our trip, we stayed on the West side. Mount St. Helens is actually a shorter drive from Portland (1 hour, 40 mins) than it is to Seattle (2 hours, 40 mins), so if you’re in Oregon, you might want to make a day trip.
Mom and I left the house around 7am and it was super foggy, we were still driving in the clouds at 60miles away from the park, so I was pretty nervous we weren’t going to be able to see the mountain. However, you start climbing in elevation pretty quickly at the end of the drive, and the sun was shining once we made it to the national monument. You’d think that since you’re going to a higher elevation, it would be colder, but it wasn’t. There is very little shade/trees anywhere at Mount St. Helens (at least on the West side), so definitely bring sunglasses, sunscreen, and water if you’re going on a warm day. Check the weather forecast for Johnston Ridge Observatory so you know how hot it will be.
Here are the spots we stopped at during our day trip to Mount St. Helens, in order along Spirit Lake Highway 504:
Mount St. Helens Visitor Center
This center is actually pretty far away from the main viewing area (about an hour from Johnston Observatory), but a good place to stop and stretch your legs. It’s across the street from the Seaquest State Park camping area There’s plenty of parking and a real bathroom. You can see the mountain in the distance, and there’s also a short trail that will lead you to Silver Lake with mountain views. Watch your step because there might be little frogs on the trail, we saw one!
Elk Rock Viewpoint
This is one of the first big pull-over stops and it has the Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument sign.
Castle Lake Viewpoint
This viewpoint has a smaller parking lot, but the view is different from Elk Rock, so I’d recommend stopping. You can see Castle Lake and more of the foreground in front of the mountain.
Coldwater Lake
This lake was stunning!! There are two small parking lots, so if one is full, check out the other down the road. It definitely gets full as people want to kayak on the lake, so try to get there before noon. There’s a 1/2 mile paved/boardwalk path, the Birth of a Lake Interpretive Trail (this lake was created during the eruption), as well as an 8.8 mile Coldwater Lake Trail with only 777 feet of elevation. The South Coldwater Lake Trail starts in a parking lot a little further down the road and takes you above the lake for a 7 mile hike with 1,400 feet in elevation (requires Northwest Forest Pass). We only did the Birth of a Lake Trail and then 1/2 mile on the Coldwater Lake Trail to take photos before heading back because it was just too hot (over 80 degrees) to hike in the sun.
Loowit Viewpoint
This is a big viewpoint right before the big observatory. It’s a pretty big parking lot and has a short paved trail with a couple of viewpoint areas.
Johnston Ridge Observatory
Parking is free here, but if you want to go into Johnston Ridge Observatory, it costs $8 for adults, but if you have a Northwest Forest Pass, that can serve as admission for one adult. This is one of the main lookouts for the mountain, so there’s plenty of parking and Honey Buckets. The Eruption Trail is a 1/2 mile short paved trail starting from the observatory building, but this is also where you can do
Harry’s Ridge, which is 8 miles with 200ft of elevation. The observatory was closed due to COVID-19, so we didn’t go inside, but I would like to one day.
On the way home, we stopped at Burgerville and got some French fries and a marionberry soda float. I can’t wait to go back to the other sides of the park! I would love to do a weekend trip in the spring and see the wildflowers.
Do you have any other places you’d recommend stopping at during a day trip to Mount St. Helens? I’d love to know, leave them in the comments below!
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