Cirque du St. Helens - Stage 1

Mt. St. Helens | Copyright 2006 Charles H. Porter, all rights reserved

Editor’s note: While I was climbing Bonanza Peak in early July, Nick and my dad took a three day motorcycle trip. This is their story, as told by Nick.

The Mission: Ride motorcycles around Mount St. Helens. Avoid the lava.

Personnel:
Chuck Porter, Nick Brown

Equipment:
Chuck: 2006 Ducati ST3. Quiet, Computerized, Liquid-cooled. Factory hard bags. 
Nick: 1995 Ducati 900SS. Noisy, Temperamental. Soft bag.

Dates: 30 June – 2 July.

Friday, 30 June.
Stage 1: Congestion and Clutches: Kirkland to Randal, WA.
Distance: 160 miles.
Conditions: High 80s, sunny. 

The previous Friday I went for a ride with Derek Shiers and on returning home I noticed I was low on clutch juice. “Hm. I wonder where the shift-enablement fluid went?” The seals on the original clutch slave cylinder had finally failed. New parts needed. My father-in-law and I started our road trip at the Ducati dealer, where my bike got its urgent slave cylinder transplant.

I was in for another treat: As I reached for my leathers, Carry chimed in with “Oh Honey, you are going to roast. Why don’t you take my summer-weight, fully-vented mesh riding jacket? You’ll be much more comfortable and less vulnerable to heat stroke.” With the tailbag strapped on and Carry’s summer weight mesh jacket tentatively zipped around my torso (my inner Mike Hailwood doesn’t like to ride in clothes that didn’t at some point say “moo”) I saddled up, twiddled the choke, said three Hail Marys, and coaxed my bike to life. Chuck just pushed his start button.

Our route would take us south on 405 and 167, changing to 161, SR 7, and finally SR12. This path was carefully planned to maximize VMG while minimizing freeway boredom. The only significant town we would have to worry about would be Puyallup, which soon reared its ugly, congested head. Imagine sitting in heavy traffic on the 4th of July weekend in 80-degree weather while sitting astride a motorbike running well north of 200 degrees and mysteriously unable to engage neutral. The traffic lights in Puyallup are long.

We battled along until a break for gas and lunch. Until Friday June 30, I had not had a commercially-prepared burger in something like five years. What a way to end the streak. At least I was on my motorcycle. After 15 more minutes of hand-to-hand combat in Puyallup, we finally broke free of the stranglehold of strip mall America and cruised south to Eatonville, home of Northwest Trek, a cool wildlife park that offers early morning photography trips. Try it sometime.

Running south on curving, empty roads through partial shade (cool air!) was wonderful. We hit Eatonville, looked at the map, and were soon making a left onto Highway 7. 7 soon delivered us to Elbe, home of the Scaleburger, where we diverted south again toward Morton. Morton proudly celebrates its logging heritage, with banners announcing the Morton Loggers Festival in a few weeks. The town is remarkably vibrant. Citizens were out walking to the store, chatting with friends at the post office where we stopped to consult the map, and teenagers were taking the Friday afternoon to hang out with friends in town rather than bee-lining it to the big city of Toledo some 30 miles west.

We arrived in Randle around 3:30. We rode right past the Randle Motel. “Did you see the motel?” asked Chuck. “I’m pretty sure it was that long, low building at the start of town.” The proprietor was not to be found, but his buddy was watching the office. Chuck got renamed “Charlie” and we got the keys to our room. The furnishings were at least 30 years old, and the bathroom was missing the glass from its window, but it was clean and would prove to be quiet.

The plan was to run down Highway 25 to the Windy Ridge view point and back before dinner – a round trip of about 75 miles. This is where the ride becomes a good bicycle trip. Drive to Randal, park the car, and start riding south. The road is worth it.

Highway 25 starts as a fun, forested, and twisty road with good sight lines, a few hairpins and for the most part good pavement. There are some areas with excessive deep cracks, smooth dips and bumps in inopportune places. The road to Windy Ridge turns off this main road and becomes much more involved. Blind corners, decreasing radius turns, collapsing sections of road, and the most awe-inspiring demonstration of nature. Blazing along through dense, old-growth forest you approach a bend in the road. Half way through the curve you burst into harsh sunlight as you enter the blast zone from Mount St. Helens’ 1980 eruption. The transition from lush, dark green to a moonscape is chilling. The landscape still looks scorched. On closer inspection you find small purple flowers and low green groundcovers starting to return. But the dead trees, both those standing and those blown flat by the explosion, depending on proximity to the volcano and the contours of the land, was eerie. So was the road. The same crumbling infrastructure as the forest road, only with sweeping views, excellent sightlines, and a honking steep cliff on one side with no guardrails. There’s nothing like consequence to focus your attention.

Windy Ridge was windy and hot. I climbed off the bike, pulled off my helmet and felt like somebody was pointing a hair dryer at my face. My water bottle was in my luggage back in Randle. Disaster. Park rangers give a talk about the changes in the landscape due to the 1980 eruption. Many of us remember the ash dusting our homes when the mountain erupted last time. When St. Helens’ eruption transitioned to its ash-spewing stage (which was the last phase of the active eruption that day) it was sending ash skyward at a rate of 600 dump trucks per second. It spewed ash for something like twelve hours. It is currently erupting, and has been since late 2004, but its ash production is a modest one dump truck every minute.

We arrived back in Randle, and walked across the street to the Big Bottom Bar and Grill. “It gets a little rowdy…” the man at the motel warned. We entered to find the Big Bottom half empty. I sat down, ordered a beer and realized how tired I was. Riding a motorcycle all day is mentally and physically exhausting. My brain was tired from running at 100% situation analysis all day. My body was tired from the heat and the Ducati’s V-twin vibration. I slept really well.

To be continued...

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