A volcanic summer vacation

It's July so we planned the first summer adventure for everyone. 

Annabelle was stoked to stay at her grandparent's house in Bremerton- where she could be doted upon for a week. Leading up to the trip she danced about the house chattering" I want you to take me to Papa and Mimi's house and leave and come back in 100 minute. No 100 days. No 100 years!!! Actually,  Ma Ma, I don't want you to ever come back".

The standard four year old has more emotions in 10 minutes than a standard adult does all year long. The night we left for the trip she she ripped our souls out like a grapefruit spoon does to a grapefruit wedge- crying and clinging " I don't want you to leave". After much consoling and book reading we were able to leave and she was asleep. 

In our eyes, Annabelle is a total bad ass - three foot tall trooper who is down for any type of outdoor adventure. That being said, hiking with a four year old is somewhat equivalent to  watching a short legged weiner dog try to keep up with a grey hound. The spirit's big but the legs are so small.  So for our kid free adventure we planned to cover some distance - circumnavigating Mount Saint Helens- a rugged 30  mile trip and then complete an epic mountain bike ride over the course of five days. But this whole plan actually ended up taking three days. 

The terrain around Mount Saint Helens was incredible and varied. There were fields of wild flowers which sprinkled the landscape in frosty colors, deep reds and indescribable purple shades. We happily lumbered along as nimble as a three legged donkey who crisscrossed hillsides, covered in massive lava rock boulders and traversing mile long landslides. Parts of the trail required ropes to ascend and descend. This was no pedestrian route for sure. 

It was surreal to see the differences between the volcanic blast zone which looked like area 51 and the rest of the trail.  Brandon's favorite part of the trip, to my dismay,  was blasting me when I walked too closely behind him in the blast zone and then reminding me that it was okay because "we were in the blast zone". 

Despite the captivating terrain, each night when we arrived at camp we decided to keep walking because without a kid there wasn't any extra wrangling. Without the extra wrangling there was so much extra time and we naively did not bring enough extra wine to be sitting around at 3:00. 

Our circumnavigation was completed in 2 1/2 days- so we decided to give the bike ride hell that same afternoon. The ride switchbacked  2,500 feet up through the forest into the alpine and popped us right up into Mount Saint Helen's ass where Brandon almost road off the edge into the oblivion. Apparently riding your bike up a volcano's ass doesn't come with all the warning labels. We road the ridge for awhile and then enjoyed a nice descent back to the van. 

A great time away from the kid but even better to have her back.