Fort Clatsop, Oregon

8. Inside Fort Clatsop

The Lewis and Clark Expedition arrived at the Pacific Ocean in November of 1805. With buckskin that was rotting off their backs, these exhausted men went about setting up camp. Weather along the Oregon & Washington coasts is very stormy in November. In fact, the weather was so bad that Clark wrote, "O! How horrible is the day."

They were north of the Columbia River in what is now Washington state. After several days they had still not found a good location to camp for the winter. The Clatsop Indians told them that elk were plentiful on the other side of the Columbia River. So the men voted to cross the Columbia River.