After boarding National Geographic Sea Bird yesterday evening we were ready for an adventure this morning. Immediately after breakfast we disembarked our ship and boarded jet boats. These boats are made to be able to navigate rocks and whitewater rapids, and are the perfect craft to get us quickly upriver and into Hells Canyon. And that’s where we were headed—about 60 miles up the Snake River above Lewiston Idaho, through beautiful scenery, amazing basalt outcroppings, and into the deepest canyon in North America.
The Snake River, at 1078 miles long, travels through four states before it joins the Columbia River in Washington State. It starts in the southern end of Yellowstone National Park. From there it heads south through Wyoming, before turning west to flow all the way across the Snake River Plain of Southern Idaho. Just as it reaches the Idaho border it turns north following the border of Idaho before eventually turning west again to cross eastern Washington.
We had a morning stop and stroll at Cache Creek, a ranch from the early 1900’s, now owned by the U.S. Forest Service. During the summer we are told it would be 110 degrees Fahrenheit there. Today it was lovely and in the mid-sixties. Fall colors were decorating the distant hillsides, a mule deer was relaxing in the old orchard, and we had a glimpse of what this place would have been like in an earlier time.
The further upriver we went, the narrower the canyons became and the more dramatic the scenery. Our jet boat drivers told us the history and natural history of the area. Along the way their keen eyes spotted plenty of wildlife. We saw three different groups of Rocky Mountain big horn sheep, lots of mule deer, an osprey, a bald eagle, large groups of turkeys, great blue herons, and a variety of waterfowl.
We turned around at the confluence of the Snake and Salmon Rivers, though many of us would have been happy to keep going. There is always the curiosity of what is around the next bend! On the way down river we stopped at the beautiful Garden Creek Ranch for lunch. This land is now preserved by the Nature Conservancy. It was a wonderful place to practice our photography skills with the historic farm machinery, the stunning landscapes, and the local wildlife—deer and turkeys.
This evening we gathered in the lounge for the traditional Recap. Grace explained how the basalt that we admired today had gotten there. And then Don shared photos from a historic Nez Perce Indian site that we went by on the river today. This was the long house where Ordway, from the Corps of Discovery met with Nez Perce to buy fresh salmon. Don Popejoy made the story come alive by reading journal entries from May 25 – 25, 1806 and showing us photos from the site today.
Soon we will be leaving the dock at Clarkston and heading down river. We are 465 miles from the ocean and many things to see before we get there in five days.
