Lewis and Clark Interpenetration Museum , Rainbow falls and Great Falls springs

Saturday, 24 May, 2014

Wanting to see as much as we could today we started out with the Black Eagle Falls.

                                                          Sunset Yesterday

Rainbow Yesterday

  Black Eagle Falls & Dam. Named after a Black Eagle nested in a tree that grew in the middle of the river (before the dam)

Entrance to Lewis and Clark Interpretation Center

Lewis and Clark 

The Center is a very elaborate display of the travels of Meriwether Lewis and William Clark on their assignment by President Thomas Jefferson, to map, chart, record animals, plants and people  (Indians)living along the Missouri River. It was thought that it went  all the way to the Pacific Ocean.

Below are some of the animals encountered/discovered/named by them.

                                                   Grizzly Bear

Wolf

                                                      Magpie Bird

Mountain Goat

                  Red-East to West Trail taken.   Blue--West to East splitting at the head                                                                            of Missouri  and Madison River

                           Nimiipu IndianTtribe Tent for up to 20 families---over 50' in length

                                    Signs of the different tribes

                                             Indian weaponry

Lewis and Clark Weaponry

        Boat Portage around the five falls in the Great Falls area, took 30 days to go 18 miles.

The following is Giant Springs,  a spring with pure water bubbling up in enough quantity to help form the Missouri River. All the water is coming from the underwater springs

 The Great Spring is one of the many "Lewis and Clark" discoveries.  It is awesome to see the quantity of water gushing from this very large pool. The pool overflows on the downstream side, as seen here, and several photos below is a view from the river side, as taken from the walkway in the distance.

                                          Upper & Lower photos show how clear the water is

 The mallard duck in the center of the spring shows the size of the spring and the water plants growing below, we also saw a fish in the spring.

                                        Water coming to the surface. Upper & lower

                                                   I'm thirsty!

 The beginning  (upper) and ending (lower) of the worlds shortest river---Roe River feeding into the Missouri

 The following is a fish pond for showing tourists the fish that the hatchery there produce. They stock over 700,000 trout each year in Montana lakes and rivers.

Feeding the fish, (5 cents doesn't buy much fish food).

Next we went to Rainbow Falls & Dam, one  of the five in the area.

 Two Entrepreneurs who helped build the city and the Hydro Dams from the falls

Rainbow Falls

 
Rainbow Falls as a dam

                                       Crooked Falls just below Rainbow Falls and Dam

                                           

                                            This shows location of all the dams and falls.

                                    
                                                  Crooked Falls, the one without a dam.

                                         The below were taken during a drive through the city.

                                                      Statue of  Fred ??????

                                   How is this for a simple planter on a city street corner.

                                         And yet another Painted Buffalo---their motto

                                Interesting roof and gable, yes that's the sky on the top floor.

American, Canadian and Montana flags. Canadian flag taller and in the center??? that's a no-no.