Man tracing route finds Lolo Trail hardest stretch
Early this spring, Norm Miller of Bozeman, Mont., set out on an expedition to explore and document the route Meriwether Lewis and William Clark took two centuries ago.
In late March, he started paddling his boat at the mouth of the Missouri River and followed the Corps of Discovery’s river routes through the central states to Dillon, Mont. Then he began the overland route, hiking through the Bitterroot Range nearly to what is now Orofino, Idaho, where he put his custom canoe-kayak hybrid back in the water Thursday and headed west.
The owner of a window-washing business, Miller said he had the ability and energy to take the months needed to travel the 2,200-mile route. “It’s something I’ve wanted to do since I was in the third grade,” he said.
Though he’s had to navigate past barges and through garbage in the Missouri River, slog through mud to find campsites, suffer the Midwest’s heat and insects and portage his boat around a number of dams, Miller said the most difficult portion of his journey has been the Lolo Trail between Montana and Idaho.
He hiked through the mountains with the help of former game warden Gene Eastman, who has spent years tracking down the original trail. Miller believed Eastman could get him as close as possible to the authentic route.
“It is hard,” said Miller, of the journey along the steep ridges. “It’s up 2,000 feet, down 1,000, up 1,000, down 3,000, up 300, down 700. I’m beginning to understand how Lewis and Clark felt.”
He also got a taste of their hunger. For the famous expedition, the 11 days it took to cross the trail was perhaps the most miserable part of the trip, with cold, snow and scarce food. Last weekend, Miller and Eastman lagged behind schedule and couldn’t make it to the camp where Eastman’s wife was waiting. Three hours from the camp, they had to settle down in the woods and wait out the dark. They had no food or bedding, so they built a fire and stayed close.
The trip was worth it, Miller said.
“I feel like I’ve walked the real thing,” he said. “The only way it would have been more authentic is if we had some real snow.”
Miller is one of thousands expected to explore the expedition’s path over the next two years, but one of very few who wants to follow every inch of it, say Forest Service rangers.
According to Christina Perry, the Forest Service agent who handles use permits for the trail in Clearwater National Forest, the numbers of users have been lower than expected.
“Definitely not as many as we expected and planned for,” she said.
And most people coming through are planning on hiking just a segment of the route, or driving through on the Lolo Motorway, she said. “But next year and the following are the anniversary years, so we don’t know what’s going to happen.”
The Forest Service decided to require permits for hiking and driving in the forest, so they can educate users on how to limit their effect on the wilderness area.
This year, the rangers have encountered one other man who said he was hiking the trail, an older fellow who identified himself as E.B. The other users visiting the Lewis and Clark trail have included tour vans, outfitters leading horseback trips and about 80 bicyclists, she said. Now that he’s back on the water, Miller expects the rest of the trip to go smoothly as he heads toward the mouth of the Columbia River.
On Friday, he canoed through Lewiston with the goal of reaching Hood River, where friends live, later this week. He plans to get to the coast before the end of the month.