Need advice on Olympic and Mt. Rainier National Parks along with Mt. St. Helens

[Sukhoi]

I'm planning on spending April 24-27 visiting those parks. First off, how much of that time am I going to want at Olympic? That's the main focus of the trip. I'll definitely be there the 24th and 25th. Can't decide if I should go to Mt. Rainier on the 26th, or just spend more time at Olympic. Is Mt. Rainier worth the drive that's well out of my way? For Mt. St. Helens is it worth taking an hour or three out of my drive back down I-5 to see it? Is there much to see without taking long hikes? I've never been in this area.

Also for Olympic in particular, I'm most interested in the mountain and coastline areas. Rainforest doesn't excite me. Is that time in April too early to try to go up to Hurrican Ridge or whatever it's called? And how would the coast be then? I'm not sure if I'd have any fun hiking around in wet nasty 40F weather.

 

[ElMonoDelMar]

Don't let the bears get you!

 

[91TTZ]

Originally posted by: Sukhoi
I'm planning on spending April 24-27 visiting those parks. First off, how much of that time am I going to want at Olympic? That's the main focus of the trip. I'll definitely be there the 24th and 25th. Can't decide if I should go to Mt. Rainier on the 26th, or just spend more time at Olympic. Is Mt. Rainier worth the drive that's well out of my way? For Mt. St. Helens is it worth taking an hour or three out of my drive back down I-5 to see it? Is there much to see without taking long hikes? I've never been in this area.

Also for Olympic in particular, I'm most interested in the mountain and coastline areas. Rainforest doesn't excite me. Is that time in April too early to try to go up to Hurrican Ridge or whatever it's called? And how would the coast be then? I'm not sure if I'd have any fun hiking around in wet nasty 40F weather.

You can drive to Mt. St. Helens and look at the mountain if you want, but you need to make sure you take the right route. The other route doesn't offer great views of the mountain but brings you to the trail if you want to hike it. I hiked it to the top and looked down the crater.

 

[fuzzybabybunny]

Olympic: The Olympic coast is awesome. You should make it a point to see Rialto Beach and Ruby Beach at least, maybe Beach 6 and 4 also. You can easily hike along the coasts of these beaches, and they're bound to offer great sunset views if the weather is clear. Lake Crescent along 101 near Fairholm (north of Olympic NP) is also quite beautiful. Just FYI, "Kalaloch" is pronounced "Clay-lock." Be sure to try and find some delicious smoked salmon, either from a fish market or from the native Quinault Indians, and keep raingear very handy. Along Rialto Beach, the waves crashing against the shore can send massive sprays twenty feet or so into the air at times.

http://fuzzybabybunny.smugmug.com/gallery/1209945/1/56600002

As for the rainforest, Hurrican Ridge might be closed, but then it might not: http://www.nps.gov/olym/planyourvisit/l...pot/security/getfile.cfm&PageID=134979

Hurricane Ridge is definitely someplace you want to see if the roads are ok. You might need tire chains. You obviously want to station yourself around Port Angeles for this.

Mt. Rainier: Great places to go include Paradise Meadows, Reflection Lakes, and Sunrise Viewpoint. The areas around Paradise will be more accessible, and you'll get great views of the mountain just by driving along the roads around it. I would definitely try to see Rainier. Unlike St. Helens, Mt. Rainier is not a mountain that you can just hike to the top of. The highest you can comfortably get is Camp Muir near Paradise, and that by itself is a pretty grueling hike, pretty much in snow all the way.

Mt. St. Helens: It's been years and years since I've been to St. Helens, and I remember Rainer just being more majestic.

 

[Sukhoi]

Ah, another trip that sounds like my rental car is just going to love.

91TTZ, it seems that the good view route is actually the one off I-5, so that's handy. It's probably worth an hour drive each way to see it while I'm on my drive back down to Portland.

fuzzy, great info! Do happen to remember if any of those beaches offer significantly better sunset views than the others? And I think everyone takes a pic of that phonebooth. I remember seeing it last night when I was searching for information. That PDF is also really helpful. Somehow didn't find it yesterday.

I'll be going to Rainier for sure after reading that. Though I don't like the name of Sunrise Viewpoint. Might mean I have to get up real early that day...

 

[91TTZ]

From a distance, Mount St. Helens isn't as impressive as Mt. Hood or Mt. Rainier. But it's an exciting hike with awesome views.

Mt. Rainier is just gigantic and can be seen from everywhere.

 

[fuzzybabybunny]

Originally posted by: Sukhoi

Do happen to remember if any of those beaches offer significantly better sunset views than the others? And I think everyone takes a pic of that phonebooth. I remember seeing it last night when I was searching for information. That PDF is also really helpful. Somehow didn't find it yesterday.

I'll be going to Rainier for sure after reading that. Though I don't like the name of Sunrise Viewpoint. Might mean I have to get up real early that day...

Hehe, I didn't know the phonebooth was that popular

As for the beaches, I'd say Ruby Beach. Besides the huge rocks that are jutting out of the water along the coast, there are just lines of tall trees and an island in the distance with a lighthouse on it that the sunset sets right into.

The problem with Sunrise I think is it's on the completely opposite side of Rainier from Paradise, so it might be quite a drive. Methinks that at Sunrise, you'll be able to see the rays of the rising sun lighting up the eastern side of Rainier, complete with alpenglow and stuff.

 

[NuclearNed]

I was at both Olympic and Rainier back in 2000. My in-laws travelled with me and my wife, so I didn't get to hike as much as would have liked.

Rainier: Sadly, I didn't get to hike here much at all, but it was for a particularly good reason. This is a massively large park, and there are a whole lot of things that can be seen from the road and short hikes. I did one high alpine hike right at the tree line in the Paradise area, and it was really wonderful - wildflowers were in bloom everywhere. If I recall correctly, the Paradise visitor's center is the starting point for many good hikes, including hikes to some of the glaciers. In my opinion, the best views of Rainier are in the Sunrise area. If I ever go back, I definitely want to spend more time there. One thing that you might want to take into account is that it is always cool and damp around the mountain. That part of Washington gets a lot of precipitation, and at high altitudes is can get quite cool. We went in August, and I took only shorts expecting it to be really warm - a really bad mistake. Since you are a photographer, make sure you take advantage of any clear weather around the mountain - during the week we were there the top of the mountain was clear of cloud cover sometimes only minutes each day.

Olympic: First and foremost: give the rainforest a chance. You don't have to spend a lot of time there, but it is definitely worth a look. At the Hoh Rainforest visitor's center there is a short walk through the rainforest that is worth the time. This may sound kind of stupid, but on this hike you will see a creek that has the clearest cleanest water I have ever seen - if not for the ripples on top of the water, the water itself is nearly invisible. Once again, we didn't do a whole lot of long hiking here, but there are some really nice waterfalls that are must-sees (most notably, Sol Duc). Hurricane Ridge is a really scenic drive with lots of wildlife (herds of deer that are not real afraid of people). Also, the coastal areas of the park are really nice. In particular, we went to Rialto Beach and I hiked to "Hole-in-the-wall", a natural sea arch. Around this arch (particularly on its far side) are some really nice tidal pools filled with all sorts of creepy-crawly sea things. We also spent a day in the Kalaloch area, which is more really nice coastal scenery.

 

[Sukhoi]

Fantastic, I have a much better idea of what to see now. I'll make sure to spend some time in the rainforest area. The Sunset area of Rainier sounds pretty cool too.

Have any of you by chance driven the state routes on the east side of Mt. St. Helens? In particular Washington 191 south from US 12, and then Washington 503 west to I-5. What is the road condition like and how far up into the mountains are they? If I'm at Mt. Rainier seems like this route would be the best way to see Mt. St. Helens on my way to Portland, but I'm a bit worried about driving that in April.

 

[NuclearNed]

I'm going through my pictures to try to jog my memory. Here are a few places we visited while there:

in Rainier:
*Madison Falls - very pretty little waterfall, just off the road and 100-200 feet in the woods. Just as notable as the waterfalls are the extremely large trees and stumps along the path.
* Marymere Falls - another really pretty waterfall, fairly tall. Marymere Falls is larger and prettier that Madison Falls, but it requires a longer hike through old growth forest and huge trees to get there.
*Sol Duc Falls - this is a must see waterfall. It is one of the most famous (& unfortunately highly visited) spots in the park, but I highly recommend it. It requires a short hike.

in Olympic:
*Crescent Lake - pretty, but not that much different from every other mountain lake you've ever seen.
* Rialto Beach - this beach is fairly representative of the entire Washington-Pacific coastline. If you stop here, hike north to the Hole-in-the-wall arch, take the steep scramble through the woods to the far side of the arch, and spend time checking out the tidal pools.
* Hoh Rain forest - we took one of the many short paths that are in the vicinity of the visitor's center. This was definitely worth the stop.
* Kalaloch area - similar to the Rialto Beach area, but probably not quite as scenic. But the park lodge there has nice cabins and a really good restaurant. From what I remember, the whole coastline has lots of pullouts with access to various scenic points. We didn't have much time to stop at them all, but the ones where we did stop were really nice.

Below are links to my favorite national park website. In particular, I've found that the section describing hikes is really reliable and accurate.
Mount Rainier National Park
Olympic National Park

 

[NuclearNed]

While you are in the area, have you considered visiting North Cascades National Park near the Canadian border? It has really spectacular scenery, and it is not as well developed or as highly visited as the other parks. My wife and I really enjoyed a couple of hikes we did there.

 

[Sukhoi]

Good stuff, I'll check all that out.

I'd like to see the North Cascades, but I won't have time and it's fairly out of the way on this trip. I'm really going to Portland to visit a friend, but I need stuff to do during those weekdays while he's at work. So that's when I came up with the idea of Olympic and Rainier. Maybe summer after this one I can make it up to see the Cascades and some of the other stuff in the area.

I also need to see Yellowstone sometime. I'm trying to get reassigned to San Francisco in July for work so if that happens I'm gonna swing by Yellowstone and the Tetons on my long drive out.

 

[KillerCharlie]

Mt. Rainier is one of my favorite places. St. Helens is cool since it's been smoldering lately, but I think Rainier and Olympic would be better. I don't think you can hike to the top of St. Helens anymore because of its activity.

However, going to most parts Mt. Rainier is going to be a problem in April. There can still be a lot of snow on the mountain then. This last summer many of the entrances were closed through June. You might even have trouble getting into some of the lower entrances (like Carbon River / Mowich Lake) and trails because of washed out roads. I usually don't start hiking in the mountains until June.

Unfortunately, April (or any month other than June-September) is just not good for hiking in the mountains. This is just from my experience of going to Rainier about 8 times in the last 2 summers.

I would wait for advice on this board from someone who lives in the area and has been there more than I have.

 

[Sukhoi]

Hmm maybe I'll just stick to Olympic and St. Helens on this trip since Rainier seems to have major snow issues. Obviously the other two will too, but at least Olympic has all the low elevation stuff to do too. Then I can make a separate trip in a year or two to check out Rainier and the Cascades. That probably makes more sense rather than trying to pack way too much into 4 days.

 

[daveshel]

I did Rainier in one day and wished I had been able to spend more time there, but I was having car trouble. St Helens is worth the drive for the cool geology from the (relatively) recent eruption. Another reason to plan extra days is that if it is cloudy, you won't see any mountains. The second day I was at St Helens you couldn't even tell you were near a major mountain, but it was still cool seeing the effects to the eruption.

 

[91TTZ]

Originally posted by: KillerCharlie
Mt. Rainier is one of my favorite places. St. Helens is cool since it's been smoldering lately, but I think Rainier and Olympic would be better. I don't think you can hike to the top of St. Helens anymore because of its activity.

They still let you hike up. I just hiked it in October.

 

[chrisms]

Originally posted by: daveshel
I did Rainier in one day and wished I had been able to spend more time there, but I was having car trouble. St Helens is worth the drive for the cool geology from the (relatively) recent eruption. Another reason to plan extra days is that if it is cloudy, you won't see any mountains. The second day I was at St Helens you couldn't even tell you were near a major mountain, but it was still cool seeing the effects to the eruption.

This is true. One of my favorite camping spots is on the Sunset side of Rainier on the Clearwater river, where you get a perfect view of the mountain. I went there in September and the clouds covered the entire mountain. Still a nice view of the river not nothing near as spectacular as when the skies are clear.

 

[91TTZ]

Here are 2 pictures I took on Mount St. Helens:

pic1

pic2

 

[daveshel]

Originally posted by: 91TTZ
Here are 2 pictures I took on Mount St. Helens:

pic1

pic2

Sweet. Especially the second.

I just did some hiking over the weekend in the San Andreas Fault zone near Mecca, Ca and am stoked on macro-geology. Now I want to revisit the Cascades.

 

[skyking]

Nice posts! OP, let the weather drive your schedule. Clear days on the north coast are rare, so if one pops up take it. Better weather can be had in the interior. If it is looking grim out west, take the trip to Rainier.
I'm about 30 miles from Rainier, and fly around all the mountains and out to the coast frequently.

 

[NuclearNed]

Originally posted by: Sukhoi
really going to Portland to visit a friend, but I need stuff to do during those weekdays while he's at work.

Recommendations for the Portland area:

* Columbia River Gorge - just a short drive outside Portland to the east. It is very scenic, and there are major waterfalls to see right off the road, including Multnomah Falls. If I recall correctly, there is a 1 mile stretch of road along the Gorge that has 10 or more major waterfalls, with very little hiking required. You could probably see them all within an hour or two. There is a little restaurant in the visitor's center at Multnomah that has a nice view of the falls, and really good food.

* Mount Hood - southeast of Portland, it is Mt Rainier's little brother, although not at developed or visited (both positive things, in my opinion). Very scenic, and the Timberline Lodge is worth the visit if you like old historic lodges where The Shining was filmed. This is open range country, so drive carefully and don't hit any cows.

* Ecola State Park - to the west of Portland near a really nice town named Cannon Beach. Both the town and especially the park are (in my opinion) the most scenic points on the entire west coast (I've driven most of it). At Cannon Beach during low tide, you will see tons of wildlife (enormous starfish, anemones, etc.) around a well known seastack known as Haystack Rock.