Tuesday July 9 2013
It is a regular presence near the mouth of the Columbia River and the Pacific Ocean, where Lewis and Clark camped in November of 1805, near the end of their 2+ year expedition across the newly-purchased Louisiana Territory, over the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean.
It is also the interpreted name ("smoke on the water") of Skamokawa, the chief of the Wahkiakum band of Tsinuk Native American Indians, whom Lewis and Clark met while wintering on the ocean at Fort Clatsop in December of 1805. This was back in the days when whites and Native Americans had friendly relations, and when the land was still wild: road-less territory, undammed rivers, untouched old growth forests, wild and prolific wildlife.
It is also a small town on the Columbia river near the Pacific (the Columbia river bar is "the most dangerous in the world to navigate"), and the site of 1 of my marbled murrelet surveys.
As I observe, the fresh-water tide falls down from the sandy beach, a fog bank floats along the upper reaches of the forested hills; bald eagles cavort, and great blue herons rove, and ospreys fish, in this Smoke-On-The-Water Lewis and Clark trail.
Beautiful landscape! Interesting facts too.
ReplyDeleteGorgeous images and fantastic informative narrative. You rock!!!
ReplyDeleteJust from the post title, thought you must be visiting somewhere in our "neck of the woods"! :-)
ReplyDeleteit is mysterious and beautiful.
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