Adventures in Geocaching, March 12th, 2015

The Thompson River

Taken March 12th, 2015

Sanders County, Montana

As my regular readers know, I've been geocaching on and off since 2006 when I bought my first Garmin eTrex Legend in Crescent City, California with the idea of it letting me know how far I was walking when hiking on the trails in the various components of Redwood National and State Parks.  Of course I quickly learned that the redwood canopy was too thick for satellite signals to penetrate.  Oh well.  Let's try something different, so remembering that Mr. Grubstake had displayed geocaching items at his restaurant high above Hamilton, Montana, I looked into a new (to me) activity.  At the time, there were over 1500 caches hidden within a 100 mile radius of my house in Smith River, California. When you consider that the house sits three miles inland from the Pacific Ocean, you have to figure that most of those caches are going to be hidden somewhere on land, that is in half that radius.  That was back in 2006.  Today, the geocaching web site doesn't allow you to search more than 30 miles from any given zip code, and there are 563 caches within 30 miles of Smith River.  Back in 2006, I was able to find 37 caches, 20 of them in October alone.  In 2007, I expanded my range outside of California and Oregon, and found 121 caches throughout the Northwest.  I took my eTrex Legend with me on the 6,000 Sunday Drive, and found caches in South Dakota, Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, West Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee as well.

Old Structure on the Little Thompson River Road

Sanders County, Montana

From 2008 through 2013, I found a grand total of 18, although four of those were in Florida, the furthest east and south I have been with my passtime.  But while I was not out geocaching, lots of other folk were.  Where there were barely 100 caches within 100 miles of my Missoula, Montana home, now there are thousands.  There are thousands within 100 miles of our home in Plains, and one way to get to know the area, is to go out hunting for them.  In 2014, I set myself the goal of reaching 300 lifetime finds before the end of the year.  By December 31st, I was well past that number, having found 149 caches during the course of the year, and I set a new goal:  500 total by year end 2015.

Winter weather is generally not conducive to searching for things in the woods, but I went out nonetheless and found 10 caches in January and 16 in February.  Then Winter left here in the Northwest, and March was very spring-like.  On March 12th, I set out with the idea of finding caches along a road I'd never traveled, the upper end of the ACM road  where Sanders, Flathead and Lincoln Counties meet.  A group of local geocachers going by the name Clark Fork Valley GeoCachers have placed a series of caches along the ACM road at roughly every 1/10 mile from where the road starts at MT 200 east of Thompson Falls to where it ends at US 2 east of Libby.  We're talking a 40 mile stretch of dirt road with almost 400 geocaches hidden along the way.  This has been my go-to path when I want to add a quick 10 or so finds to my list.

The ACM road was built by the Anaconda Mining Company back in the days when they were logging this area to supply support timbers for the mines in Butte.  There is a county road that parallels the ACM road just a few hundred feet away.  BUT, and it's a big but, there is a river that flows between the two:  the Thompson River.  Both roads run from MT 200 to US 2, and both are heavily salted with geocaches.  I've looked for only a few of the county road caches, but have hit the ACM road more heavily, and today I thought I'd go to the end.  The map made it look as if the ACM road skirted the southern bank of the Thompson Lakes, and I'd never been there, so why not.

Old Barn on the upper Thompson River

Flathead County, Montana

From our house, as the crow flies, it's just a couple miles to the Little Thompson River Pass Road, but it's a bit further by car.  Once on that road, it's an eighteen mile drive up and over the pass on a road that is mostly dirt, although this trip there were patches of snow and ice, and once I started down the western slope, there was a lot of rock that had fallen into the road bed.  I found myself twisting the steering wheel right, then left, then right, just to avoid the rocks.

Once down to the confluence of the Little Thompson and the Thompson, I turned north and headed toward my first cache of the day.  Kevin had bought me a new Garmin Montana 650t GPS unit for Christmas, and I was making the most of it.  For today's trip, I had programmed in some 70 caches along the last seven miles of the road.  The first was an easy find, as were the second, third, fourth, and so on.  It looked like it was going to be a great day, but then I got to number ten.  Nothing.  Couldn't find anything that looked right.  OK.  Spend some time, but then move on.  There are plenty more.  Number eleven started out elusive, but, ah, there it is!  Having found eleven, I walked back to where number ten was supposed to be, thinking that maybe approaching from a different angle would improve my chances.  Nope.  Still nothing at site ten.  And it started snowing.

Middle Thompson Lake looking North

Lincoln County, Montana

I decided to drive on to the end of the road, try to find a new cache hidden along US 2, then turn around and see what I could find on my way home.  The road dumped me out onto Highway 2 much sooner than I expected, but I turned left toward the West, and was quickly up to highway speed.  After fifty miles of dirt road, it felt good to be able to drive faster than 25 mph.  I passed Middle Thompson Lake and looked at my Garmin to find that the new cache I was seeking was still several miles ahead of me.  No, this was not what I was wanting.  I still had to get back home, and the fastest way meant backtracking on the dirt ACM road.  Otherwise, I would have to go all the way to Troy (63 miles), then south to Noxon (43 more miles), where I would still be 70 miles from home.  As an alternative, I could drive east to Kalispell (47 miles), which would put me 85 miles from home.  No, the 50 miles of dirt road seemed like a better option.

Realizing that somehow I had taken a turn off the ACM road, which is why I got to US 2 so quickly, I started looking for my original objective.  And sure enough, just between Middle Thompson Lake and Upper Thompson Lake was my road, and a geocache.  Found that one quickly (ACME 372 was its name), and just as quickly found ACME 371 and 370.  In fact, I found every cache through 364 and stopped along the way to take some pictures of the lake.  By this time it was getting late and I hadn't brought along any lunch.  It was time to stop looking for caches and head on home.

Middle Thompson Lake looking West

Lincoln County, Montana

No problems with the drive, and as I climbed the Little Thompson River Road, I met a road grader moving the rocks I had dodged earlier off the roadbed.  Didn't have to bob and weave so much, just inch my way past the grader, and from there on it was smooth sailing the rest of the way home.  All told I found twenty caches and had a great day out enjoying our beautiful northwestern Montana home.

Caches found:  ACME 300, 301, 302, 303, 304, 305, 306, 307, 308, 309, 311 (NOT 310), 364, 365, 366, 367, 368, 369, 370, 371, 372.

New Yaak Times

Oo ah oo ah oo oo, Kitty
Tell us about the boy
From New York City
Oo ah oo ah come on, Kitty
Tell us about the boy
From New York City

George Davis & John T. Taylor

To hear the Manhattan Transfer sing Boy From New York City, click here.

Thompson River
Taken 7/26/09
Sanders County, Montana

Clicking on a photo or a link will open a new window. In my opinion, these photos look much better at full screen, so that's what will happen should you click on one. You also have the option of seeing all the edited photos from this trip on my Picasa web gallery.

In the early days of vehicular traffic, Montana's cities sold license plates printed with the city name on the plate. In the early 1930s, Montana standardized plates state-wide, using a one or two digit code to designate the county of registration. This system remains in place today, although with the advent first of vanity plates and then affinity plates, more and more cars sport the three letter, three number system used by so many other states. Montanans of my generation can still tell you what county a car comes from if the car owner just gets the no extra cost regular plate. The county numbers haven't changed since they were first introduced over seventy years ago. They represent the political clout a given county had in the state legislature back when the system was first introduced.

Lincoln County is neither the smallest county in area, nor the last county created in the state. It has never been the smallest county in population either, but in a state with fifty-six counties, Lincoln County vehicles bear the number 56. This reflects the remoteness of the northwestern most county in a very remote and sparsely populated state. And in remote Lincoln County, far from any possible madding crowd, flows the Yaak River. After spending Saturday on the Blackfoot River, on Sunday we climbed in the back seat of Mike and Norm's 1997 Lincoln Town Car and headed north and west. We were going to see the Yaak.

As I noted in my post Adventures in HDR after having spent a day on the edge of Glacier Park, we had planned to drive back and head across the Going to the Sun Highway. This would be a very long day, however, and we were worried if Norm had the stamina for the trip. Norm, however, had other ideas. He wanted to see the Yaak. Of the four of us, only Kevin had ever been to the Yaak, so in time we agreed, and Sunday's drive, while no shorter than the planned Glacier trip, presented a fascinating collage of rivers, forests, mountains, lakes, rain and sunshine.

When Mike and Norm first moved to Montana from Memphis, they bought land and a cabin just outside Thompson Falls, the county seat of Sanders County (number 35 on our license plates). Thompson Falls proved too remote when Norm was needing dialysis three times a week, which meant a two-hundred-mile round trip drive to Missoula for each session. They sold their place in Thompson, found a house just across the railroad tracks from us, and moved to Missoula. Mike, Norm, Kevin and I get together roughly three times a week for dinner, ham radio events, or sight-seeing jaunts across western Montana.

We left Missoula (county number 4) heading north on US 93 and crossed into Lake County (number 15) just south of the town of Arlee on the Flathead Indian Reservation. At Ravalli, we turned west on Montana highway 200, and followed the Flathead River toward its confluence with the Clark Fork just east of Paradise. (I could make a comment about being East of Eden, but I'll forego that pleasure.) Along the way we crossed into Sanders County, and stopped to pick up some road food at the supermarket in Thompson.

Our route north from Thompson took us on a forest service road (read dirt and gravel, not pavement) along the western bank of the Thompson River. Who is this Thompson anyway? Well, David Thompson (1770-1857) was an explorer, a fur trapper, and as one web-site puts it, "arguably the greatest geographer the world has ever known." You can find more information on Thompson than you probably ever would want by clicking here.

Thompson River Valley Farm
Taken 7/26/09
Sanders County, Montana

Now if you remember your US History lessons, prior to the signing of the Oregon Treaty in 1846, all the land north of the 42nd parallel and west of the Rocky Mountains was in dispute. The US referred to this area as Oregon Country and the British called it the Columbia Department of the Hudson's Bay Company. You may have heard of a campaign slogan from the 1840s, "Fifty-four forty or fight." This slogan referred to the southern boundary of Russian America (established in 1825), the area we now know as Alaska, which was simultaneously the northern boundary of Oregon Country/Columbia District. I'm sure you've heard the phrase "Manifest Destiny" which also refers to the fact that Americans felt it their God-given right to control all land from the Atlantic to the Pacific, including all of Oregon Country. President Polk campaigned on the issue of securing America's northwest, but in the end chose to compromise with the British, rather than fight them, and the 49th parallel was set as the international boundary. Polk found other ways to be belligerent, however, and at the same time add to the US land mass by sending in troops to fight the Mexicans, understandably upset over the loss of Texas. Unfortunately for the Mexicans, they lost this war which led to the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo which added the land south of the 42nd parallel and west of the Rockies to the U.S. In short, having already lost Texas in 1845, Mexico lost an additional 55% of its land thanks to this treaty. If you live in the states of California, Nevada, Utah, most of Arizona and New Mexico, and that part of Colorado and Wyoming west of the Rockies (and south of the 42nd parallel), you live in what was Mexico until the 1840s. The little bit of Arizona and New Mexico that wasn't ceded by the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was then purchased from Mexico in 1853 in what is known as the Gadsden Purchase. The purchase was supposed to include considerably more land than we actually took, but for some reason, the Mexicans, having first lost Texas then everything west of the Rockies through the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, just didn't want to give up any more land. Go figure.

But this post covers the Northwest, not the Southwest, so let's return to David Thompson, the Hudson Bay Company and Oregon Country. More specifically, let's return to Sanders and Lincoln Counties, Montana, where Thompson, in the employ of the Hudson Bay Company, left his name on just about every topographical feature to be found. As we drove north along the Thompson River, the rain began to fall. It would follow us, off and on, the rest of the day.

In time, we reached US highway 2, and turned west toward the Lincoln County seat of Libby. Libby has become known nationally, and perhaps world-wide, because of the law suits against the W.R. Grace Company who until recently mined vermiculite there. The resulting asbestos exposure has made life a living hell for many Libby residents. Asbestos be damned, we said, and stopped for breakfast at the Treasure Mountain Casino Restaurant. My $4.99 steak and eggs breakfast was one of the best breakfasts I've had. And you certainly couldn't beat the price.

Yaak Falls
Taken 7/26/09
Lincoln County, Montana

Having fed both ourselves and the Lincoln, we continued west on 2 through the town of Troy. When we first turned onto Highway 2, we passed a chain of lakes, also named for David Thompson. At Libby our route took us alongside the Kootenai River which has its headwaters in Canada, flows south into Montana, west into Idaho, north back into Canada, and finally joins the Columbia. Western Montana is a mountainous region, and the average elevation across the state is close to 3,000 feet. Missoula, for example sits at 3200 feet. At Troy, the mountains above us made it hard to believe that the lowest point in the state is where the Kootenai River crosses into Idaho (1800 feet in elevation). Less than five miles from the Idaho state line, we turned north to follow the Yaak, and immediately began climbing.

We stopped to check out a campground on the Yaak, then again at Yaak Falls where both I and my camera got thoroughly soaked. No I didn't fall in the river or over the falls, but the rain picked up again while I was studying a group of teen-aged boys who were climbing the falls then jumping off the cliffs into the river below.

Boys will be boys
Taken 7/26/09
Yaak Falls, Lincoln County Montana

Back in the car, soaked to the skin, I kept quiet as we drove through the town of Yaak--ok, the wide spot in the road known as Yaak. I would have liked to stop at the bar and asked if the newspaper was still being published. Yes, I'm afraid it's true, there used to be a paper, or maybe more of a newsletter, printed up and distributed under the name of The New Yaak Times. According to the Library of Congress, this paper was printed monthly in Bonner's Ferry Idaho, just across the state line. The road continued to twist, turn and climb, until sixty miles from the lowest point in the state, we crossed a pass at nearly 7,000 feet. From there we descended toward the Kootenai River and Lake Koocanusa--a reservoir held back by Libby Dam and named because it's the Kootenai River (KOO) and covers ground in both Canada (CAN) and the US (USA). Bet you'd never have figured that one out.

By this time it was getting late. The GPS unit on the Lincoln's dash was warning us that we needed coffee, and we were all getting tired. A quick stop in the town of Eureka where I found a rare 1958 Packard--well a 1958 Studebaker that had a special nose and Packard badges showing how the mighty fall--then south on US 93 into Flathead County (Number 7--bet ya thought I'd forgotten my county numbers), through the resort community of Whitefish, the county seat of Kalispell, and alongside Flathead Lake which brought us back into Lake County, Missoula County, and home.

Lake Koocanusa near Eureka, Montana
Taken 7/26/09
Lincoln County, Montana

I won't speak for Norm and Mike, but Kevin and I were exhausted and glad to climb into bed once we gave Rocky his shot of insulin. And as for the Yaak? I can't wait to get back up there.

Till next time.