Mt. St. Helens N.V.M.

Sunday we left the Rainier area, & headed south to Mt. St. Helens National Volcanic Monument.

 Yup.  We saw a lot of these road signs.
Since it was sunny & clear we drove in to the Johnston Ridge Observatory.

 It's as close as you can get to the mountain, without hiking in.
We didn't do too much hiking in the area, since the temp's were upper 90's and there is no shade.

 The observatory also has a really good movie about the eruption in 1980.
The two rock hounds in the family loved the geology & seismology that gave explanations and first hand accounts of the massive force behind the eruption.
The power, and the devastation is impressive.
So is the speed with new life and regrowth in the area.

 And the contrast of beauty rising from ashes is just lovely.

 And as we rolled into Vancouver, Washington for the evening the sun started to sink lower, and the temperature began to dip, we enjoyed a meal outside along the Columbia River with this kid and his shirt:

He gets more comments on that shirt than you can imagine.  That night he got a visor with his meal.
It went pretty well with the shirt.