North Dakota

The state capitol building dominates the Bismarck, North Dakota skyline. The Missouri River is in the background.

Fort Mandan was the expedition's home during their first winter.

It was located across the river from a large village of the Mandan tribe, who were very friendly and helpful to the travellers. Here Lewis and Clark engaged their Shoshone guide, Sacagawea, as interpreter and often peacemaker, for the remainder of the trip to the Pacific Ocean and back.

The triangular fort came to a point at the rear, where a sentry walked a catwalk each night through the bitter winter. Lewis recorded temperatures sometimes as low as 45 degrees below zero, and on the coldest nights, each sentry was only on duty for 30 minutes.

Mary sits outside the Captains' quarters at Fort Mandan. They had a small room with a large fireplace, and they were quite warm when they stayed inside.

At the Lewis and Clark interpretive center near Washburn, ND, a partially completed dugout canoe made from a single cottonwood tree is on display. The expedition made and used canoes like this after they sent the keelboat back from Fort Mandan to St. Louis carrying the first records and artifacts for President Jefferson in the spring of 1805.

Skip looks fierce in a buffalo skin robe like the ones the plains natives wore.
The Yellowstone River, which drains southern Montana and collects tributaries from northern Wyoming, enters the Missouri River near Williston, North Dakota. (In this photo looking south, the Yellowstone flows from center rear towards the Missouri flowing right to left in the foreground.)
Upstream on the Yellowstone River, farmlands fill the rich floodplain bordered by cliffs.

Lake Sacagawea is a dammed portion of the Missouri River that is more than 100 miles in length in western North Dakota.
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