We drove down the night before and camped at Climbers' Bivouac. And were up bright and early in the morning, out of our tents by 4:45am and, after a somewhat hearty breakfast, on the trail by 5:35am.
The first part of the hike was a steady climb through the forest, and then you get to above the tree line when it really starts to get steep. There is an endless ocean of boulders to climb over (and even harder to climb down at the end of the hike!). There are great views of other Cascade volcanoes, including Mount Hood in Oregon, as well as Mount Adams which is less than 100 miles away. After getting through the boulders, you're rewarded with an equally steep climb through soft ash and pebbles. About three-and-a-half hours after starting, we reached the summit!
It's an amazing view from the top - you can see Rainier right there, with Spirit Lake as well. And the entire crater is right in front of you - you can see how it blasted out sideways from the mountain and the hole that is left. There have been some lava domes that have formed in the 40 years since the main eruption, which are growing inside the crater now.
We had the summit largely to ourselves, and stayed up for an early lunch before starting the grueling hike down. We were done by 12:30, about 7 hours after starting.
