Ape Cave: Creepy
So last weekend the wonderful Gray Fund ran a trip to Ape Cave, which is a several mile long lava tube running off Mount St.Helens, a couple hours drive outside Portland. A lava tube is formed when you get a massive stream of lava flowing away from a volcano, and then the lava on the outside hardens to form a crust over the still-molten lava on the inside. When the stream of molten lava slows and then stops, you're left with a long, regular tunnel such as Ape Cave. (How was my explanation? Geology isn't my strong point.)
Upon reaching the Ape Cave parking lot we had to hike a mile or two up to the entrance to the cave, then climb down a ladder into a narrow, cold passageway which continued in the same grey, cold, fairly regular fashion for another mile or two, roughly downhill. We were provided with helmets and headlamps, which is good because it was absolutely pitch black down there. No guides, (no branching passageways), no tours, and no lamps on the walls. It was utterly bizarre, and rather reminded me of the London Underground, both tubes being more or less the same size and shape. The lava had left odd ridge-like formations which occasionally looked like a car, or in fact a tube train, had run through the tunnel.
I have actually been to Ape Cave before, on a family vacation to Oregon when I was about 12, but none of it looked that familiar. This is mostly my crap long-term memory, but also because I'm pretty sure that when I was 12 we only took the lower cave. The lower cave is shorter and further down the hill, and easier to walk. This time we obviously had to take the upper cave as well, which involves far more scrambling over boulders and navigating small cliffs, (with minimal light, remember). It was harder-going than I anticipated, but I loved hiking along in the creepy darkness. At one point I was separated from my group, so I turned off my lights and waited in the pitch black for a while, listening to the distant echoing of voices and ceiling drips, and thinking the most ghoulish thoughts I could manage. Marvellous!
Upon reaching the Ape Cave parking lot we had to hike a mile or two up to the entrance to the cave, then climb down a ladder into a narrow, cold passageway which continued in the same grey, cold, fairly regular fashion for another mile or two, roughly downhill. We were provided with helmets and headlamps, which is good because it was absolutely pitch black down there. No guides, (no branching passageways), no tours, and no lamps on the walls. It was utterly bizarre, and rather reminded me of the London Underground, both tubes being more or less the same size and shape. The lava had left odd ridge-like formations which occasionally looked like a car, or in fact a tube train, had run through the tunnel.
I have actually been to Ape Cave before, on a family vacation to Oregon when I was about 12, but none of it looked that familiar. This is mostly my crap long-term memory, but also because I'm pretty sure that when I was 12 we only took the lower cave. The lower cave is shorter and further down the hill, and easier to walk. This time we obviously had to take the upper cave as well, which involves far more scrambling over boulders and navigating small cliffs, (with minimal light, remember). It was harder-going than I anticipated, but I loved hiking along in the creepy darkness. At one point I was separated from my group, so I turned off my lights and waited in the pitch black for a while, listening to the distant echoing of voices and ceiling drips, and thinking the most ghoulish thoughts I could manage. Marvellous!
posted by susie r at 3:20 PM
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