We woke up and Jeff made a tasty breakfast of spam and eggs. Then we headed out for the day’s activity, a 2 hour boat tour up the Missouri in an area called “Gates of the Mountain”.
We were on an open air boat that held about 50 people. The amazing tour guide told us so many stories related to the history of their boat company (which pre-dates Montana as a state), and then the geography and history along the way.
The rock in this part of the Rockies rose up almost vertically and folded in on itself. you can see the layers in the photos. Some layers of the rock is older than most life on the planet and other layers have tons of fossils in them from ancient sea beds and dinosaurs.
She also told us about Mann Gulch. In 1949, there was a wildfire in the gulch and smokejumpers were fighting it while waiting for the airplanes to bring support. Their radio broke on the rough landing, and they were deep in the gulch and had to fight the fire to the river. The wind turned and trapped them. They all started to run, but the leader of the group set a small back fire and then laid down under his firefighting jacket. The fire burned right over him, but he didn’t get burned at all, though anyone who didn’t follow his lead perished. This incident changed how smoke-jumping and firefighting was done-requiring more redundancies, an escape plan, and more methods of communication.
We also saw an eagle’s nest, a rock troll, a petroglyph/pictograph and stopped at a picnic spot where Clark stayed overnight when they paddled through. We saw the infamous “gates” of the mountain that was mentioned in Lewis and Clark’s journals and it reminded us of scenes in Lord of the Rings where they paddle past huge guardian statues on each side of the river.
Afterwards we stopped at the gift shop where I saw some gorgeous lupine flowers blooming in a pot and may have grabbed a couple seed pods for a future flower pot. Then we went back to the campsite and relaxed, took naps, and read books for a few hours. Later Spencer, Jeff and I went to the Hauser Dam nearby which failed a year after it was initially built (one of the stories the guide told us on the boat). It had gotten rebuilt soon after and is what created the reservoir that our campground is near. You can still see the wreckage of the old dam and the powerhouse is still in use. There were people fishing under the dam and lots of birds, probably swallows, were flying around.
Kline Road Trips 
This all sounds like an adventure we need to take. I haven’t explored much West of the Mississippi. Amazing pics, keep posting:)
Ginger