Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center

We headed west to Great Falls, Montana to visit the Lewis& Clark Interpretive Center.  We had last visited this museum eight years ago, but I’ll admit I didn’t remember much about it. My intention had been to visit the C. M. Russel museum, but it is closed on Mondays. The museum tells the story of the Lewis an Clark Expedition, beginning with finding equipment and supplies in Philadelphia until they reach the coast of Oregon. It particularly focuses on two areas: the tribes encountered along the way and the 18 mile portage around the five falls in this area. A couple interesting facts about the Indians. First, they spent a winter with the Mandan Indians in South Dakota; here they met a French Fur Trader and his Indian wife, Sacagawea. While she did not guide the party anywhere, she proved instrumental when they needed to trade their canoes for horses in order to cross the Bitterroot Mountains in Idaho. She had been taken by the Mandans from her people as a young girl, and as luck would have it, she recognized her brother as they headed west and he was chief of the tribe. The expedition also had very few problems with any Indian tribes, since she was along, the Indians felt this wasn’t a war party. The other interesting fact about the Indians is that Lewis & Clark, noted the words in each Indian tongue for common objects. Jefferson felt that there would be commonalities among the languages for Indians that had frequent contact. As they crossed the Bitterroot Mountains, the words of the languages changed, indicating a different family of languages and Indians.

Portage around Great Falls

The Great Falls proved to be the toughest obstacle on the entire journey. It took them 2 weeks to portage the 18 miles around these five falls, pulling their dugout canoes on a home-made wooden cart up and down the hills. They lost some of the canoes and had to spend another 2 weeks remaking 2 canoes before they could continue their journey.

Eagle Falls today (one of 5 falls)

After our stop we continued up to Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada to stay at the Bridgeview RV Park, a compact park with lots of trees. The place was filled with RVs from Alberta. As we crossed Alberta, the land changed from ranch land to agricultural land. Everywhere the fields are bright yellow with Canola, but we also see wheat, corn, and flax (in a beautiful blue/purple tint).