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Ape Cave and Merrill Lake 9/15/07

Posted by jeffstatt (2007-09-19)

Last Saturday we took a group of kids out to Ape Cave near Mount Saint Helens in Washington

According to Sullivan, Ape Cave is the longest lava tube in the Western Hemisphere. 

The parking lot was full this saturday morning.  So full, in fact that we had to wait for a spot to open.  I was bit surprised by this since it was after Labor Day, it was still early, and it was kinda a gloomy day.  Oh well. 

It's a short hike from the trailhead to the mouth of the cave. 

 

 

Once down the steps into the cave you enter the blackness and a flashlight, headlamp or latern is required.  Not too far in you come across a metal set of stairs that you decend about 40 feet.

At the bottom of the stairs you can continue forward for the "lower cave" which goes about .8 mile.  It's an out and back.  You can also choose the "upper cave".  Do an about-face at the bottom of the metal stairs.  It goes about a mile and a half where you'll find a way to exit and take an above-ground trail back to the trail head.

 

 

 

This day we chose the short trail.  The group split between older and younger kids.  I was with the younger group .  Well they didn't last long.  Before we went a quarter mile they had seen enough - the darkness was a bit overwelming for them.  It didn't help that one of the kids mentioned that the cave reminded them of that cave on the asteriod in "Return of the Jedi".

 

After the trip to Ape Cave, we split from the group and I took my boys out to Merrill Lake, which is just south of Mount Saint Helens.  There is a small campground there that we thought might be nice to check out.

The lake is a shallow mud bottom lake.  It appears to be a dammed reservoir, although I don't know that to be the case.  It was immediately clear that this was a popular fishing hole as there were probably a half dozen within an immediate line of sight.

On the drive back down, we caught this view of Yale Lake

Not far from this spot there was a turn-off and the kids got out and tried to scale this cliff.  The photo was taken in such a way to make it look more perilous than it was.  The ground level is immediately off-photo below.

 

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