The Ride to Mt. St. Helens is nothing to blow your top over!

Our next port stop brings us to the town of Kalama, WA. We were in port from 12:00AM until 10:00PM. Early risers could join Cruise Director Rhiannon for a 7:00AM walk around Kalama. Neither of today's two tour options started until mid morning and later so the morning also featured a presentation onboard at 9:30AM about all the other itineraries American Cruise Lines offers. Usually you'll see this presentation listed in an ocean cruise schedule as the Future Cruise Talk. Those with the afternoon excursion were encouraged to try out one of the board and card games offered for independent play. 

Both of today's excursion options were complimentary options. The first to leave at 10:00AM was to visit the Port of Kalama Interpretive Center. This low activity level excursion is listed as "at your leisure" during a five hour time frame. This was another museum where ACL had taken care of admission and you only needed to wear your lanyard for entry. We did not visit the center ourselves but ACL describes it as a "short walk from the ship" and ADA compliant. 

Port of Kalama Interpretive Center 

Explore this new facility that celebrates Kalama's unique place in Pacific Northwest history as a transportation and commercial hub and is designed to replicate a traditional waterfront warehouse of the 1800s. Exhibits track Kalama's first inhabitants, the Cowlitz Tribe, and the settlers that followed over the next hundred years, including renowned Oregon Trail writer Ezra Meeker. Displays illustrate how Kalama's particular landscape gave birth to a booming transportation system, impacting the area both culturally and economically. 

The second option we did choose was the Mount St. Helens Scenic Drive. This excursion does have a long coach ride but stops at a couple places along the way for a total of 4.5 hours. The excursion is classified as moderate. 

Mount St. Helens Scenic Drive

Enjoy a scenic ride to Mount St. Helens. Mount St. Helens, located in southwestern Washington about 50 miles northeast of Portland, Oregon, is one of several lofty volcanic peaks that dominate the Cascade Range of the Pacific Northwest. It is the youngest of the major Cascade volcanoes, in the sense that its visible cone was entirely formed during the past 2,200 years. Take in the beautiful views of the landscape and the crater left behind by the eruption. 

Growing up in the 80's I was fascinated with the story of the Mount St. Helens eruption as a kid. This is one of those landmarks you'll find that everyone says to make sure you visit at least once when visiting the area. The bus ride featured some commentary and a video of an educational special was shown on the bus monitors. While our tour buses couldn't go all the way up toward the closer viewing area due to a landslide closing the road, it was still worthwhile to visit the two places we did. Unless you're our bus driver who missed the turn on the way to our first stop and had to go all the way to where the road was closed to turn around and come back. Gave new meaning to scenic drive and got us to the right venue minutes before the informational movie we all were told to go watch first was to start. 

Our first stop was to the Mount St. Helens Visitor Center. The $5 per person admission for adults was included for our group. The Visitor Center's website lists a charge of $200 per tour bus. This small center featured a movie viewing room with a couple options, a series of displays to peruse, and an interactive network of paths and a tunnel between the exhibits so you can experience what it was like inside the volcano space wise. The only downside was that the place was packed on the day we visited. Several of our senior aged tour group were left to stand at the back and along the side of the theater since the 15-20 rows of seats were filled with families. Thankfully some of the parents were kind enough to offer their seats to our more differently abled group members. My suggestion to ACL for the future would be to arrange a reserved time for the movie as our tour group would have filled all the seats ourselves. The interactive displays were mobbed since everyone went from the movie to the displays so we chose not to stay inside too long. 

As my Dad always says "Never pass up a bathroom opportunity!" so we left the crowds to use the restrooms located toward the back of the building. I got a good chuckle out of this sign on a few of the stalls:

We ended up having great luck with the weather on this day and spent the bulk of our time outside in front of the building where they have a viewing platform for Mount St. Helens.

Our second stop was to another viewpoint closer to the volcano at the Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument. This observation deck was a great spot for clear views and photos.

I asked Dad to help create a photo to look like he was putting his finger on the top of the mountain. He could have a future as the stand in for "I'm a little teapot."

Snacks were provided and handed out at this second stop by our Excursions Director Lindsay. American Cruise Lines is definitely consistent as our provided snacks was bins full of chip packs and individually wrapped almost melted cookies. The same arrangement of chip packs is always available in the lounge onboard:

These also make great options to carry in your excursion tote/backpack as there are no rules about taking food ashore when you've never left the USA. 

The even smaller gift shop at this second location had a couple handcrafted wooden magnets so I added another souvenir to my collection:

The buses dropped us off at the end of the road leading up to the pier so it was a bit of a walk along the waterfront. The crew always had a golf cart available to pick up anyone who needed assistance walking back down the dock.