Sept. 7, 2010

Last night wasn't the best sleep I've had!  I was in my sister and brother-in-law's home in Denver.  They aren't there so I was alone in their rather large home.  Around 2:00 a.m. I woke to an alarm that sounded like it could be in the house, but I'd opened the window in the bedroom so I wasn't sure.  I got up, walked downstairs and determined that it wasn't in their house, but wondered if it might be the alarm on my car.  I looked out the windows (from behind the curtains) to see if I saw anyone lurking around ... I didn't, and I could see it wasn't my car.  So I went back to bed.  Eventually, the alarm stopped, but my imagination hadn't! First I heard a crackly sound ... at this noise, I was on high alert ... could someone have entered the house ... had I forgotten to lock a door?  Silence ... I settled down and was almost asleep when I heard a creak, actually two, but not in quick succession.  My mind: could someone be walking slowly and quietly to the bedroom ... should I get up and go through the house ... if someone is there, what will I do?  I waited, thinking that if a person came through the door, the best I could do is say, "What do  you want?" This seemed a pretty vulnerable position in which to be, but I stayed where I was ... and finally, silence and sleep overcame me, but not without a dream about two women having come into the house, with a key, and not knowing I was there, getting ready to go to bed.  We had a sort of friendly conversation ... and then the dream was gone ... thankfully!

During all of this, and in moments not on "high alert", I thought about Lewis and Clark.  They wrote about fretful nights, usually from bears around their camp, or bugs bothering them, or illness.  I was comforted to know I'm not the only one who has bad nights!  It's funny how right now there have been articles about bedbugs, and I'll have to say, I've been checking in the motels where I've stayed!  I doubt L & C had to deal with them (unless, upon departure, the bugs were in clothing, etc.), but they had mosquitoes and lice and all sorts of other miserable varmites to deal with.

I was thinking, too,  of other similarities between my trip and theirs.  I was thinking how easy it is for me to get the things I need along the way, whether it's food or fuel or some trinket.  All I do is go to a store and purchase what I need.  They, too, purchased things along the way, but I'd not thought of it that way.  They bartered with the Mandan Indians for corn during their first winter and with the Shoshones for horses.  But they were trading goods for goods, and what they often had to give up was extremely important to them ... guns, gun powder, whiskey, blacksmithed items.  The Indians drove harder bargains than L & C had imagined.  Of course, they needed what they "bought," but the intention was not to give up their important goods.  I am thankful for currency!

Another similarity is that when corps members got sick, they medicated themselves.  I have my aspirin bottle and bandaids, just in case.  They had Benjamin Rush's pills, which were filled with mercury and arsenic, etc.  Can you imagine?  Today we bring in men in white suits to clean up a broken thermometer.  Yet, Lewis was a very competent doctor for the corps.  Though often sick, all of the men with the exception of Sgt. Floyd, who died of what's thought an appendicitis attack, made it though this very arduous journey.  And Lewis's treatments, be they herbal or chemical, kept them remarkably healthy.

I thought too about how they picked up a Shoshone guide along the way, up in the Rockies.  And today I picked up my friend ... at the airport in Denver, so we can travel together in the Rockies.  Pretty cool, all in all.  Here we are at Denver International Airport before riding off into the sunset.

From the  airport we set off for Steamboat Springs, climbing from around 5,280' (I hope that's a mile) to about 7,000'.  We had dinner in Hot Sulphur Springs at Dari-Delite; this was the only place we found open and we had their specialty, cheeseburgers ... oh, and a little cone to top it off (L & C would have loved ice cream, I'm sure.)

The scenery has turned to mountain delights.  Pines, birches, wildflowers, streams, high valleys with grazing cattle, hay bails rolled and ready for market or consumption.  It's hard to put the beauty of the mountains into words.

The view from Dari Delite