2013 Western Trails 1

Western Trails 1

Fo!owing Lew" & Clark and Beyond

Journal kept by Susan Hanes during a trip to the western United States from September 23October 12, 2013. Photos by Susan Hanes and George Leonard, copyright 2013.

Western Trails 1

Fo!owing Lew" & Clark and Beyond September 23 – October 12, 2013 The Lewis and Clark Expedition was the first American expedition to cross the Continental Divide into what is now the western portion of the United States. Following the Louisiana Purchase of 1801, President Thomas Jefferson directed Captain Meriwether Lewis to assemble a group of men to explore and map the newly acquired territory and to find a practical water route across the western half of the continent. The story of the Voyage of Discovery is one of the most remarkable of our nation’s history, and was the motivation for our road trip to the west, leading us off main roads and away from major cities, and allowing us to discover parts of the American West that neither of us had visited before. On our way west, we followed the Lewis and Clark trail as closely as back roads permitted; once we reached Astoria, Oregon and the mouth of the Columbia, we followed other famous trails east, touching parts of the Santa Fe, California, Mormon, Oregon, and Nez Perce Trails as we made our way home. During the course of three weeks, we drove almost 6500 miles through thirteen states, stopped in eleven state capitols, and saw the varied landscapes of our country. We came home with great admiration for our guides, Lewis and Clark, and a renewed wonder of the land that is the United States.

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Monday, September 23

% Iowa City, IA

It was the first day of fall and a beautiful, crisp morning as we cleared Chicago traffic, heading west. It was coincidently on this day in 1806 when Captain Meriwether Lewis wrote to President Thomas Jefferson that he and Clark and their party had safely returned from their Voyage of Discovery.

St. Louis. September 2', 1806.

It " ( pleasure that I announce % ) * safe a+ival , myself and party at 12 OClk. today .In Obedience % )r orders we have penetra- * Continent , North America % * Pac/ic Oce0.

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Followed the Ronald Reagan Memorial Highway to Dixon, Illinois, Reagan’s boyhood home, stopping to take a picture of the modest white clapboard house. Did not take the tour, to the apparent disappointment of a docent who was just about to open the door when I hopped back in the car. US 30 carried us though Sterling to Morrison, where we took photos of some old grain elevators and admired the colorful street art—literally street art—that covered the asphalt along several blocks of the historic area. Passed miles and miles of cornfields, most of them dry and awaiting threshing. The trees are showing only a hint of yellow at this point.

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Crossed the Mississippi into Iowa at Clinton, and made a brief stop to see the Van Allen Building, designed by Louis Sullivan in 1912 as a department store. Three intricate terra cotta foliate medallions dominate the faรงade that also features lacy bands of terra cotta along each floor. In Mt. Vernon, drove through the shady Cornell College campus, founded in 1853 and renamed in 1857 after William Wesley Cornell, a prosperous merchant and devout Methodist whose distant cousin founded Cornell University a decade later.

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A few miles brought us to Cedar Rapids, where we sought out another Louis Sullivan design, the People’s Bank, built in 1911. The finished building was far simpler than Sullivan originally envisioned, as the bank owners felt it would have been too expensive to carry out his original plan. The simple structure nonetheless features beautiful terra cotta designs and fanciful gargoyles. Today, the bank is closed and the historic building is looking the worse for wear, a result of major flooding in 2008. Continued south to Iowa City and after driving

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through the attractive campus of the University, checked into the Vetro Hotel, an “industrial modern” kind of place that reminded us of our hotel in Hvar, Croatia. But at least here, the door to the bathroom is opaque. Hamburgers and local beer across from campus at Short’s Burger & Shine, converted from a 1920s shoeshine place, where the place is hopping, the beef is brought in from Ed Smith (26.5 miles down the road), and the craft brews are all Iowan. Jake asserted unequivocally that the fries were the best he’s ever eaten.

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8 Lou" Su!ivan’s Merchants’ National Bank

Tuesday, September 24

% Omaha, NE

Left Iowa City at 7:30, joining I-80 on a brilliant morning.

Glad we were heading west, for the sun was blinding.

Lovely drive through rolling hills of golden corn, dotted with patches of deep green trees. Stopped at Grinnell to see Merchants’ National Bank, built in 1914 and one of several intricate “jewel box” Midwest banks designed by Louis Sullivan. Enjoyed a country breakfast at the Frontier Café on Main Street before continuing to Des Moines.

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Set amidst small towns and big farms, Des Moines is an impressive capitol city. The State Capitol Building stands high on a hill above the town and has to be one of the most beautiful capitols in the nation.

Completed in 1886, the building has a golden dome flanked by four smaller domes. What really impressed us, however, was the interior. Its columns and ornately decorated walls, ceilings, and floors feature 29 different types of marble.

The law library is absolutely stunning, and rivals any grand European library: a spiral staircase, shelves to the ceiling, stained glass‌I told the librarian who was Xeroxing papers that in a place like that, she should have a scribe scratching copies with a quill pen.

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Iowa State Capitol Des Moines

Continuing west to Omaha, we encountered torrential rain for a good part of the way, but it conveniently cleared up as we got into town. We located the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail Headquarters on the river, where we spent an hour or so talking to Jill, a park ranger who had traversed the Trail, and got her recommendations of the most important sites for us to visit. We also picked up a copy of Moulton’s abridged and annotated Lewis & Clark journals. Got to the Joslyn Art Museum at 2:15, a pink confection of Art Deco.

Joslyn Art Museum 13

We spent an hour and a half immersed in the watercolors of Swiss artist Karl Bodmer and the meticulous journals of Prince Maximilian of Germany, created during their 1832-34 voyage into the furthest reaches of the American Interior. Bodmer’s paintings are some of the most compelling visual accounts of the West ever created: they gave us a sense of what Lewis and Clark must have encountered only 30 years earlier.

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At 4:30, checked into the historic Magnolia Hotel, built in 1923 by a Chicago financier, and a popular location for Omaha weddings. After happy hour at the hotel bar, where we sipped Magnolia’s own label Pinot Grigio, we climbed into the hotel Suburban for a ride to the Old Market, Omaha’s historic 19th century warehouse district. We strolled around and looked into the windows of quirky shops, bars, and restaurants, and took pictures of the bricked facades and painted signs. Fatty rib eye steaks and a hearty zinfandel at M’s Pub, where we sat against the wall behind the bar and had a bird’s eye view of all that transpired there, watching as relationships ebbed and flowed during the evening. Back at the hotel we shared a nightcap of coffee and cookies before retiring to our room.

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Wednesday, September 25

% Vermi!i1, SD

An 8:30 departure got us to Lincoln by 9:15.

Drove through the historic Haymarket District where Jake stopped and I hopped out to take pictures of the late 19th century warehouses that have been converted to shops and restaurants.

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Nebraska State Capitol Lincoln

Visited Nebraska’s State Capitol, an imposing Art Deco structure completed in 1932 that is the polar opposite of Iowa’s ornate building.

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Located on the University of Nebraska’s east campus, the International Quilt Study Center holds the largest privately held quilt collection in the world. The more than 3500 quilts date from the 18th century and represent more than 25 countries. We enjoyed going through the current exhibits but were somewhat disappointed that there were not more quilts on display. Of particular interest to me was a collection of old photographs depicting people with quilts, paired with actual examples of the quilts pictured.

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Drove southeast from Lincoln to Nebraska City to visit the Missouri River Basin Visitor Center. Replicas of the type of keelboat and pirogue used by Lewis and Clark were on display, giving us a sense of their size and weight and the difficulty of maneuvering them. The displays 22

focused primarily on the flora and fauna encountered by the Corps of Discovery. At 1:00, we crossed the Missouri River back into Iowa and dove north to Lewis and Clark State Park, near Onawa, where we found a shaded park, lots of campers, and a working keelboat.

After juggling maps, Google, and two guidebooks, we determined the way to the Sergeant Floyd Monument, located on a bluff overlooking the Missouri River Valley near Sioux City. Charles Floyd was one of the first men to join the expedition and the only one to lose his life along the way, succumbing to a ruptured appendix on August 20, 1804. A tall obelisk marks his burial site; it was the first designated National Historic Landmark in the United States. I stood there, thinking about how that wild land of 1804 had given way to cultivated fields, tall buildings, and major highways, and marveled at what the Expedition members could never have imagined.

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Down at river level, we visited the Sioux City Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center. Dioramas and displays recreated the expedition from a military perspective. Although it was very well done, Jake and I agreed that a little bit of “interpretive center” goes a long way. We felt far closer to history at Sergeant Floyd’s Monument, where there was an opportunity to pause and quietly reflect on the incredible venture these men undertook in the name of the United States of America. Driving north, we passed into South Dakota and stopped for the night at a Holiday Inn Express in Vermillion, home of the University of South Dakota. Dinner at Café Brule on the main street of this surprisingly quiet college town. I tried a Prairie Mary, a mixture of tomato juice and Bud Light with pickles and olives floating in it. What was I thinking?

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Thursday, September 26

% Pie+e, SD

Before leaving Vermillion, we drove through the University of South Dakota campus; Jake waited while I took a photo of Old Main, the oldest building on campus. Dating from 1883, it was rebuilt after a fire, using an assortment of materials and adornments from the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair.

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Six miles north of town, we stopped at Spirit Mound, sacred to the Indians long before Lewis and Clark arrived in the area. The men had heard that it was a “place of Deavels� and wanted to explore it for themselves; we were amazed that they were motivated to travel more than ten difficult miles inland to climb it.

Route 50 took us west to Yankton, “The Cow Capital of South Dakota,” as proudly announced a plaster cow-topped platform.

Evidence of the town as a stockmen’s center was evident everywhere. Gassed up at a small station where a group of old men was congregating. I made a quip about the gathering and one replied with a grin, “Yup, a meeting of the minds—not much minds but we do meet.” Crossed over Gavins Point Dam to Nebraska and continued west along Scenic Byway 12, known as the Outlaw Trail, named for the likes of Jesse James, Kid Wade, and Sam Bass. The road took us through lowlands and grasslands, rolling hills and wide-open prairies. In Niobrara (pop. 364), we stopped at the post office so that I could mail a tee shirt to Em. When I mentioned to the postal lady that I hoped that the good weather would hold, she said she hoped so too, for her family was going to bail hay tomorrow and even a little rain could be devastating.

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At Lynch (pop. 245) pulled off to read an historical marker detailing L&C’s encounter with “barking squirrels” (prairie dogs) and their adventures trying to flush one out to take with them.

(They got one, and it made it all the way back to Washington alive.)

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At Spencer (pop. 452) we turned north, stopping at the site of Fort Randall, built in 1856 as a military outpost. After pausing at an overlook, we walked through the cemetery, containing the remains of 86 men, women, and children who had died between 1856 and 1888.

Each simple wooden marker displayed only the name and an identifier: “Ashotia Dezaire, Colored Citizen” or “Marian, Mexican” or “Elizabeth Mitchell, Child” or “John Grey Horse, Pvt. 21st U.S. Inf.” or simply, “Unknown.” A registry posted nearby listed the unimaginably varied causes of death, including typhoid fever, pneumonia, drowning, killed by Indians, scurvy, suicide, freezing. The ruins of the post chapel nearby added to the poignancy of the place.

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Crossing the Fort Randall Dam, we continued north through absolutely flat country until we reached I-90 and shortly thereafter, Chamberlain, SD. Made a whirlwind run through the Akta Lakota Museum, located on the campus of St. Joseph’s Indian School; it is an outreach institution that supports the school’s worthy operations. Turned off at the Chamberlain Visitor’s Center for a view of the Missouri before turning north again on Rt. 83 to Pierre. The road was devoid of signs, mile markers, and traffic, and we sailed along past fields of golden

sunflowers and barn-red sorghum. Arrived in Pierre just in time for another museum-scramble at the South Dakota Cultural Heritage Center. We had only a short time before closing, but we were there long enough to be impressed by its collections, dioramas, and displays—and its excellent gift shop. We also made a brief visit to the imposing South Dakota State Capitol building, completed in 1910. I read that its design was a modified version of the Montana State Capitol in Helena. It will be interesting to compare.

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S2h Dakota Cultural Heritage Center 33

S2h Dakota State Capitol Pie+e

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After checking into the Ramkota Hotel, we took the desk clerk’s suggestion and drove five miles out of town to the Cattleman’s Club, just the kind of place where you would want to have dinner in South Dakota. Crowded with substantial, healthy-looking rancher types, the place has been serving steaks since 1986 when Myril J. Arch bought the property with his son, Myril II. I had the best steak I have ever eaten. Truly, the best. I can’t speak for Jake, but he left a clean plate, too.

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Friday, September 27

% Medora, ND

Got away before sunrise, heading for Bismarck, but our early start was quickly offset by a wrong turn and 20 miles in the opposite direction.

Breakfast at the Fireside Steakhouse/Lounge/Casino in Oneida (pop. 742).

Our car was the only non-pickup in the lot. Country eggs and “coffee so fresh you might have to slap it.� Back on the road by 9:00, were again delayed by a warning from State Trooper Hannah (with perfect teeth and who had obviously been trained to deal with difficult people) who caught Jake doing 70 in a 65-mile zone (never mind that the road was straight and empty and there was a dearth of signs). At Selby (pop. 707), turned west on US 12 and crossed the Missouri River at Mobridge, entering an Indian reservation.

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At a crudely executed sign, turned down a gravel road to see the “Sakakawea� (as they spelled it there) and Sitting Bull monuments.

Jake left me to take pictures of them both. The way to Sitting Bull took me along an ill-maintained path to the oddly moving sculpture, gazing out across the Missouri. Others obviously had felt the same way, as a little pile of tokens had been placed at the foot of the monument: pennies, lighters, feathers, stones.

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As we crossed into North Dakota, I spotted a cowboy, riding his horse, wearing a Stetson, and driving his herd, not 50 yards from the road. My Pulitzer Prize-winning photo will never be seen because it was not to be taken. But it lives in my mind along with other “one that got away” photographs. As we headed north, we could see that the trees had more color and the land was becoming a little more irregular; buttes appeared on the horizon, contrasting against the cloudy sky. Also noted that virtually every road sign had been shot up. Arrived in Mandan, “Where the West Begins,” and continued to Bismarck (so named to attract German immigrants).

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North Dakota State Capitol Bismarck

With some difficulty, found the North Dakota Capitol building, surprisingly located in a residential neighborhood. Built in 1955, it is a 19-story office building of an undistinguished Art Deco style. Viewing the interior was constrained by the fact that the new inductees to the ND State Bar were having lunch in the main hall.

Continued north to Washburn, once an important trading post in pioneer days. Now the area shows evidence of the huge coal-powered electrical generating plants that surround it, their giant smokestacks belching out such clouds of smoke that they competed with the dark clouds in the sky. The time here has been manipulated to Central in order to keep multiple power plants in the same time zone. Along with an imaginatively created “Obama Lies!� installation involving an old tractor, we saw a significant number of antiabortion signs on the road as we drove along.

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Reaching the Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center near Fort Mandan, we were delighted to find a marvelous museum filled with period artifacts and Bodmer prints—the best such center we have visited so far.

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Two miles down the road a young man took us through a reconstruction of Fort Mandan, located somewhere near the spot where L&C wintered over in 1804-5. Our guide, Robert Hannah, told us how the fort had been carefully reconstructed with the greatest attention to authenticity. Looking at the log fort with its tiny rooms and sleeping lofts above, we found it hard to imagine how the expedition managed to survive in -45 degree temperatures. Robert is a native North Dakotan; he told us that his home state is the least visited in the U.S. and that most people come to North Dakota to fill out their list of 50 states visited. I hated to admit that it was true for me too.

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In spite of running short of time, we made a quick drive north of Stanton to the place where the Knife River and the Missouri meet.

The Knife River Indian Villages Site was established in 1974 to preserve the historic and archaeological remnants of the Northern Plains Indians, including the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara tribes who had contact with Lewis and Clark. An outbreak of smallpox almost obliterated them, sparing only 31 of the 1600 villagers. An exact replica of an earth lodge let us imagine what life was like among these indigenous people before the arrival of the white man.

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In a light, steady rain, we drove south and connected with I-94 for the 100-mile drive to Medora where we had reservations at the 1884 Rough Rider Historic Hotel, just outside Theodore Roosevelt National Park. I wondered what was going on when I spotted not one, but two pink Cadillacs in the parking lot.

When I asked a bejeweled and well-coiffed young woman who was handing out pralines in the lobby what was going on, she told me that it was a regional meeting of Mary Kay Cosmetics ladies, who had gathered to honor one of their own who had earned the rank of National Sales Director, “the highest honor of all� in the Mary Kay hierarchy. We decided at that point that we would look for a dinner place elsewhere. Determined that Boots Bar & Grill was crowded with enough local folks to warrant an exploration. Although we ordered the wrong thing (Fleischkuechle), we enjoyed people watching and chatting with our waiter, a recent graduate of Carroll College in Helena who was working in Medora to relieve his substantial college debts.

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The North Dakota Badlands at early morning

Saturday, September 28 We drove out of Medora to see the sun just breaking on the hills of the Painted Canyon area of Theodore Roosevelt National Park. An overlook of the North Dakota Badlands at the Visitor’s Center gave us a panorama of broken topography and colorful hues. Although we did not see any bison, we found ample proof of their presence as we gingerly stepped across the grass. Heading north on US 85, we started seeing evidence of the fracking frenzy going on in the Williston Basin area of northwestern North Dakota. Williston sits on top of the Bakken formation, which produces more oil than anywhere else in the U.S. and has the potential of producing as much as 500 billion barrels, using the controversial “frac” petroleum extraction technique. Quite a dichotomy, seeing hay bales dotting the green fields on one side of the road and oil pumps and storage tanks on the other. Trailer camps, prefab houses, and sterile multi-floor hotel-like structures gave evidence of the sudden onslaught of workers, suggestive of what the 1849 Gold Rush must have been like. Deep rumble strips on the sides and center of the highway indicated that sleepy rig drivers frequented these roads, 24/7. We felt quite insignificant in our little sedan, sharing the road with an unbelievable number of tankers and trucks hauling large equipment. Road construction compounded the chaos, as the area’s meager highways were being enlarged by as many as six lanes to accommodate the traffic. Stopped for gas at a giant new Kum-n-Go at Watford City. While Jake pumped gas, I went into the convenience

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% Fort Bent1, MT store where I chatted with an oilman who was buying coffee. He told me he was from Colorado and had been in Watford for four years; in that time, he had seen the population expand by 500 percent. “Not all of the newcomers are upstanding individuals,” he added. I asked him what he thought of fracking: was he concerned about the environmental impact? He assured me that he thought it was completely safe; the water table is at 800 feet, while the drilling occurs thousands of feet below the surface. We did not discuss the impact of the flaring of natural gas that lights up night satellite photos like a metropolitan city. As we both watched a steady stream of giant rigs thunder through the intersection, he commented that Saturdays are the slow days. Jake was beginning to wonder what had become of me, when I returned to the waiting car. We decided that Watford would be a great place to have breakfast; stopped at the Little Missouri Grille, a corrugated box with a giant parking lot full of huge pick up trucks. Not an exaggeration: ours was the only car in the lot. Inside, I was one of the few females. We ordered our eggs and toast and looked around.

Almost every table was occupied by burly, tee shirted young men; some were speaking Spanish, almost all sported ball caps. Got underway, heading west on a road that was being graded to three times its size.

Saw fracking operations on both sides of the highway at no more than half-mile intervals. As we turned west and crossed the Yellowstone River, saw a train pulling tank cars that vanished over the horizon.

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“… I walked down and joined * party at their encampment 3 * point , land formed 4 * junction , * rivers; found them a! 5 g6d health, and much pleased at having a+ived at 8 long wished 9 spot …”

Meriwether Lewis, April 25, 1805

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Back in our Lewis and Clark mindset, we paused at the confluence of the Missouri and Yellowstone Rivers, the place that Lewis described in 1805 as “This long wished-for spot.” We walked down to a boat launch near the Interpretive Center to get a sense of the view that Lewis had when he wrote those words.

During the 19th century, numerous forts had come and gone in that area; Fort Union, the most important fur trading post on the upper Missouri from 1828-1867, has been reconstructed. We eventually reached it after creeping along a construction area and bouncing on ruts with massive shovels and dozers working only a few feet from our side mirrors.

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We exited north on a gravel road, which we followed for 16 miles before rejoining US 2. At that point, things opened up and we were back under the Big Sky. The road paralleled train tracks for several miles and we continued to see trains with miles of unit cars, all of them tankers.

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Detoured from the main road to visit the Fort Peck Dam, a massive project initiated by FDR in 1933 as a means of creating postDepression jobs. The dam is one of the largest hydraulic earth-filled dams in the world, and was immortalized by photographer Margaret Bourke-White on the first cover of Life magazine. We drove along the crest of the dam, 250 feet above the tunnel outlets, and completed our detour; were back on the highway by 4:00. Drove straight on to Fort Benton, near the place where L&C first saw the Rocky Mountains, arriving just after sunset.

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We are staying at Montana’s oldest operating hotel, the Grand Union, built in 1882 at the height of the Missouri River steamboat era. After a meal downstairs of fresh fish and vegetables and a crisp Sauvignon Blanc, we were happy to settle into our comfy room.

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Sunday, September 29

% Helena, MT

Took advantage of a luxurious opportunity to sleep in and awoke to window panes rattling in a 35 mile an hour wind. Looked out and realized that the hotel is right on the Missouri; the wind had kicked up quite a bit of wave action. After a breakfast quiche and coffee, tied my scarf securely around the back of my head and went out to take pictures. Besides the Grand Union Hotel, greater downtown Fort Benton, with its shabby unoccupied buildings, is a shadow of its former self. It was established in 1846 as a major trade link; for the next thirty years, it attracted steamboats carrying goods, merchants, miners, and settlers who came in from all over the eastern U.S. 57

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While we waited for the history museum to open at noon, we drove back to Loma to visit Decision Point. Just south of town, I climbed up the quartermile trail to the overlook of the confluence of the Maria’s and Missouri Rivers. From this stunning vantage point, I could imagine the Corps of Discovery camped by the river below. Lewis and Clark took ten days, from June 3-12, 1805, to decide which river might lead them to the Northwest Passage. Gazing down, it was easy to understand why it was so difficult for them to determine the direction that they should take.

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Forty miles south of Fort Benton brought us to Great Falls, where L&C spent 32 days, longer than anywhere else besides the places where they wintered over. The National Historic Trail Interpretive Center there illustrates the entire expedition, from beginning to end, through a series of displays and dioramas that carries the visitor along each step of the way. Although Jake complained that it was geared to children, I must admit that I got a lot out of it. A diorama illustrating the incredible challenge of the portage up the Great Falls was especially illuminating.

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We retraced 10 miles or so to visit Ryan Dam, built on the largest of the five Great Falls of the Missouri. Just before 3:00, got on I-15 for the hour and a half drive to Helena. Even on the Interstate, we were treated to dramatic scenery, as we passed rugged cliffs rising from the river.

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Montana State Capitol Helena

We had reservations at The Sanders, a B&B on Ewert Street, but had told them not to expect us until late. After gassing up (we had been a little nervous after we heard the “ding” that we were on reserve on a very lonely stretch of road), we went by the Capitol building, which bears a great resemblance to the South Dakota Capitol in Pierre. Drove up and down the streets of the historic downtown, Jake pausing while I jumped out and took photos of various details. Stopped at lively Blackfoot, the local brewpub, where we tried (and loved) the Hop Harvest IPA, made with fresh hops “straight off the vine.” Since Blackfoot has only a taproom, we moved a couple of doors down for green chili burgers at Miller’s Landing; ordered off a menu that was so water stained that it looked like parchment. Arrived at The Sanders at 8:00; warmly greeted by Bobbie Uecker Ringling. The house, remodeled to its present appearance in 1889, was the home of frontier lawyer, vigilante, and U.S. Senator Wilber Fisk Sanders and his suffragette wife, Harriet.

Bobbie showed us to our spacious and quirky room, the one that had once been the Sanders’ bedroom, decorated with antique photographs, 19th century furniture, and circus memorabilia.

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Monday, September 30 Woke up earlier than we intended when the alarm that the previous guest had set went off at 4:30; dozed until it was light outside. A congenial group around the breakfast table consisted of a local woman who was still basking in the excitement of her surprise 70th birthday party; her friend from New Hampshire who had flown in to attend the party; and artists Setsuko Watanabe-Morinoue and Hiroki Morinoue from Holualoa, Hawaii, who were in Helena for two weeks while Hiroki served as artist in residence at the Holter Museum of Art. Rock Ringling, our host, served marvelous

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% Di!1, MT mushroom omelets and banana bread and Bobbie pulled up a chair with her coffee and joined the conversation. Time flew by and it was almost 11:00 by the time we pulled away. Before leaving town, we visited the Capitol building. Although the Montana State Employees Charitable Giving Campaign was in full swing in the rotunda, we were able to see how similar the interior is to South Dakota’s Capitol.

Across the street, we visited the Montana Historical Society Museum, going through an excellent time-line of Montana’s history and seeing an exhibition of the art of cowboy painter Charles Russell.

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As we drove south to Three Forks, the sun broke through the clouds. The sun was shining for the L&C expedition as well, when Sacagawea recognized the area when the party arrived on July 27, 1804. We continued to Missouri Headwaters State Park; the place was shut down for the season and there was no one in sight, but we persevered despite the chill wind and walked out for a view of the Jefferson, Madison, and Gallatin Rivers, where L&C camped for several days while they decided which would lead them towards the Continental Divide.

At Three Forks by Charles M. Russell

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The Headwaters , * Missouri

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It was 3:00 by the time we arrived in Virginia City.

Long shadows made for interesting photos of this surprisingly authentic ghost town, although most establishments were closed for the season. Found an interesting item in the window of an antique shop; asked at the mercantile store next door and she will send me a telephone number to follow up.

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Continued on MT 287 with views of snow-covered mountains shrouded in mist; noticed traces of snow in various places along the road. Golden aspens are starting to appear as well. Reached Dillon at 4:30 and made a beeline for the Patagonia outlet store. We both found jackets at bargain prices. Decided to stay at the Best Western Paradise Motel on the edge of town. Dinner was a real treat: we ate at the Fiesta Mexicana, located in an old school bus. Victor, 18, was born in Chicago, and operates this 7-days-a week restaurant with the help of his sister.

He is there most of the year, except when he returns to his family in Mexico for two months in the winter. The food that he prepares is fresh and authentic. We sat on benches on the bus and ate way more than we should have, washing it down with Diet Coke.

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Tuesday, October 1

% Missoula, MT

An inauspicious start to the day. We woke up early, had a quick breakfast, gassed up the car, and were on the road by 8:00. But after we had driven almost fifty miles south and were well along the gravel road to Lemhi Pass, I realized that I did not have my small camera. We were unable to call the hotel to ask them to look for it until we had driven back 30 miles to get cell coverage; continued the rest of the way to the hotel, wondering if they had found it. We were so relieved that it was there that Jake was not even upset that my mistake had set us back 100 miles and two hours. Returning on I-15 to Clark Canyon Dam, we passed an overview of Camp Fortunate, one of the more significant points along the Lewis and Clark Trail. It was there that L&C met the Lemhi Shoshoni Tribe and cached their canoes and a stash of supplies for the return trip.

Sacagawea had recognized the Shoshone chief, Cameahwait, as her brother, enabling the expedition to gain acceptance by the Indians.

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As we drove back to the start of the gravel road, Jake expressed concern about taking our sedan over the pass. He had anticipated being able to get information about current road conditions and was quite surprised that he was not able to find out anything substantive from the Forest Service when he called them. The pass consists of a 25-mile gravel road, 12 miles of which are in Montana and 13 in Idaho. The first part of the drive took us through private ranch lands where we passed cowboys herding cattle along the road. Three antelope bolted in front of us a mile or so further. As we ascended, we encountered less gravel and more exposed soil. Although there were no potholes and few blind curves, muddy spots in sections were quite slippery and demanded caution, especially since there were no guardrails on the narrow, onelane road. Looking out, we saw grassy slopes with a sprinkling of trees.

When we reached the summit (7,373 feet), we took pictures of the view spread before us: the place where Lewis “discovered immense ranges of high mountains still to the West… with their tops partially covered with snow.” A stone at the summit marked the Continental Divide. We chose to descend by the shorter, but more precipitous, Agency Creek Road and agreed with Lewis when he wrote that he found it much steeper on the western side. We paused to read a sign that indicated the place where the Corps of Discovery had made their first camp in what is now Idaho. At last we completed the final mile of gravel and joined ID 48 N at Tendoy, which we followed to the town of Salmon.

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Stopped at the Sacajawea Interpretive Center but were disappointed to find that it had closed for the season. We were, however, able to photograph her well-known statue. Got on US 93, paralleling the Salmon River; it carried us over Lost Trail Pass (7,014 feet) where we passed heavy forests and large rock formations with snow-covered peaks in the distance. Unlike Lemhi, the road was excellent, although our route was 1,000 feet below that followed by L&C. We descended to the Bitterroot Valley, and after passing through Darby and Hamilton, reached Missoula at 3:15.

Missoula, home to the University of Montana, is located at the mouth of Hell’s Gate Canyon, on the Salish Indian route to the Great Plains. Drove around before deciding on a Holiday Inn close to the center of town. After a lot of discussion about where to go for dinner, we decided to just stay there, have drinks and dinner at the restaurant downstairs, and listen to a local combo playing cool jazz. Sometimes, easier is better.

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Wednesday, October 2

% Wa!a Wa!a, WA

Before leaving Missoula, explored the campus of the University of Montana, including Grizzly Stadium. Jake waited for me to walk to the wide quad where the 1889 University Building stands in proud contrast to the modern buildings that surround it; I can’t say that I liked the mish-mash of architectural styles. At Lolo, eight miles away, near the confluence of the Bitterroot River and Lolo Creek, we visited Traveler’s Rest State Park, where a ranger explained the significance of the site. L&C camped there on September 9 and 10, 1805 and again on June 30-July 2, 1806. Truly amazing discoveries of significant archeological findings as recently as 2002, such as latrines with traces

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of mercury and fire hearths, make this the only site on the Lewis and Clark Trail that has yielded physical proof of the exact location of a camp. As we left, the ranger warned us that Federal facilities had been closed as a result of the most recent government shutdown. Fourteen miles west of Lolo on US 12, the road began to wind through lush forest, paralleling the Clearwater River. Large rocks came into view and we saw snow in the distance. At the summit (5,235 feet), we saw that the Lolo Pass Visitor Center had been a casualty of the government shut down. It was locked up tight and a sign was posted.

The only sign of life was two deer.

We descended to the Lochsa-Clearwater Canyon, stopping at intervals to photograph dense forests and sheer cliffs descending to river rapids.

There was a total lack of development for more than 100 miles—no gas, no food, no litter. It was wonderful. Leaving the Clearwater National Forest, the road straightened out and houses and gardens started to pop up. When the road passed into the Nez Perce

Reservation, the land immediately became arid. We saw numerous fishing boats on the river and passed several National Historic Sites that were closed. Maybe the workers had all gone fishing, courtesy of Uncle Sam. In Lewiston, we stopped for a late lunch at Main Street Grille, a classic diner decorated with historical photos of the community, located on leafy Main Street.

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The Bi:e+6t Va!ey

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Passed through Clarkston, driving through the Palouse, the rich farming area south of Spokane, Washington, where we saw rolling hills of geometrically plowed fields that looked almost abstract in the late afternoon sun. Arrived in Walla Walla at 4:00 and tried to find a room at the grand old Marcus Whitman Hotel, which was totally booked by a conference of gynecologists. We did make dinner reservations at the hotel’s Marc Restaurant and checked into the Best Western. After a break, we drove down Main Street and through Whitman College, a picture-postcard liberal arts college founded in 1859. Returned to the Marcus Whitman at 7:00 where we enjoyed dinner with fresh local ingredients paired with Washington wines.

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Thursday, October 3 to Astoria, OR

Just west of Walla Walla, we turned in to the Whitman Mission National Historic Site, commemorating the city’s beloved Marcus Whitman, a missionary who led the first large party of wagon trains along the Oregon Trail to the West. Whitman, with his wife Narcissa, was killed by Cayuse Indians when they suspected him as the cause of a catastrophic measles epidemic. But being part of the National Park Service, the site was closed as a result of the government shutdown. As we returned to the highway, we encountered signs to eight vineyards and passed three or four more; the area is called Wine Valley, although it is quite flat.

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We followed US 730 as it hugged the banks of the Columbia, offering splendid vistas; we stopped at a turnout at Two Sisters to take photographs of the cliffs, and again at Hat Rock, so named by L&C on October 19, 1805.

Crossed into Oregon on the Interstate for 70 miles or so, following the Columbia, and then took the bridge back to Washington.

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Ascended on a winding road to Goldendale where we could clearly see Mount Rainier and Mount Hood from a plateau above the river.

Returned to the river valley, driving from Maryhill to The Dalles, pausing for photographs at several vistas.

Stopped at the Columbia Gorge Discovery Center, the official interpretive center for the region, but realized once we were there that we were interpreted out.

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Joined Oregon’s historic Highway 30, a narrow, winding road with few guardrails that curved up to Rowena Crest, offering a spectacular panorama of the Columbia River Valley. Returned to the Interstate at Mosier; tried to visit Bonneville Lock and Dam, but like other government-managed institutions, it was closed. We were able to peek over the fence. Skirting Portland, we headed northwest to Cathlemet where, by coincidence, we were able to roll onboard the ferry five minutes before it departed, getting back to the Oregon side of the Columbia in nine minutes. Our L&C moment on the water at last!

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View ;om Rowena Crest

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An easy 30 miles brought us to Astoria, at the mouth of the Columbia, by 4:00.

After driving through town to get our bearings, we checked in at a new Hampton Inn a mile down the road. Returned to this historic town in time to explore, noting the interesting architecture.

After L&C’s arrival in 1805, Astoria was officially founded in 1811 by John Jacob Astor as a fur trading post, making it the oldest town west of the Mississippi. After much deliberation, we chose to have dinner at Clemente’s on Commercial Street.

What seemed so promising when we arrived turned out to be a mediocre meal with rather patronizing service.

Still, we enjoyed our cozy corner table and the Copper Hill Pinot Gris from the Willamette Valley.

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Journal kept by Susan Hanes during a trip to the western United States from September 23- October 12, 2013. Photos by Susan Hanes and George Leonard, copyright 2013.

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Volume 1