Mount St. Helens - Worm Flows Route — Saturday, Jun. 17, 2017

After reading all the trip reports reporting hitting the trail at 5am (?!) we were nervous about being able to reach the summit, as we were planning to come from Seattle that same morning. It turns out that it's totally doable provided you have appropriate equipment (crampons! poles! ice axe!), keep a steady pace, and approach the hike with the knowledge/healthy attitude that you might need to turn back early.

We left Seattle at 6:30am and arrived at the trailhead at 10am. After gearing up and signing in, we hit the trail at 10:30am. We were definitely the last ones to leave (or at least the last ones to leave who made it to the summit). It took a little less than an hour to get to Chocolate Falls. From there we took the rock ridge up to the weather station. On the climb up there was cloud cover blocking views of the mountain. We checked with people descending and they said that the cloud layer was quite thin and that it had not prevented them from summiting.

At the weather station we put on crampons, and began the slog up through the snow. I cannot stress the value of crampons enough. You can rent them from REI if you don't want to own. We also used poles for stability. We passed 5 - 10 people on our way up who were also ascending, but I don't think any of them made it to the summit. The cloud layer cleared and we had spectacular views the entire way.

We arrived at the top at 3:00pm (4.5 trip time). The summit is actually pretty underwhelming, as you should stay well away from the cornice. Others at the top told us we could hang a right and reach a viewing point that looks over the canyon. It was breathtaking (see pics).

At 3:30pm we were the last off the summit, though others started down only shortly before us so we kept people in view all the way. We tried glissading for the first time and it was SO FUN! We glissaded down to the weather station, and arrived with very wet feet (we forgot gaiters but definitely would have benefitted from them). I stopped to change into dry socks and pants, and we took the rocks down the rest of the way.

I wouldn't recommend glissading much further past the weather station. The snow gets shallower and you see many more rocks poking through. YMMV.

We passed 10 or so people on our way down, and I suspect the last folks arrived back at the Sno Park around 8:30 - 9:00pm. We arrived right at 7:00pm, then began the long drive back to Seattle.

All in all, the long day was totally worth it and we had a ton of fun. Were we to do it again, however, we would camp/stay near the trailhead the night before or drive to Portland after the hike and hang out for the rest of the weekend. If you're planning to do what we did, make sure you're prepared! Stay safe!