Being Louis and Clark would've been a heck of an adventure. Honestly, doing something like that is my dream. I'd love to grab a couple of buddies, take what we can carry, or rather, what we can boat, and set off on a random river to find the ocean. All the while gathering information and talking with whatever people we find. Looking at new wildlife, new plants, animals, native peoples, and simply land formations. Nature at its finest: the glorious unknown. As an assignment in my history class I was to act as Louis/Clark and explore a small section of land and give a summary of what I found like Louis and Clark had done. For this I picked none other than my friend Josh to accompany me. Often he had walked his dog down a trail across a creek. We intended to explore that creek deeper into the forest than he had yet ventured. As we followed he took notes of different plants and the such and I took notes in the form of a map. I payed no exact reference to elevation, but gave a rough estimate by appearance. As we walked we already knew, because of how we lived in the area, that this creek would not lead to the Mississippi by any means. We did find small fish in the river, signs of craw-dads, and many surface insects. Most if the bank was mud, but at times there was sand. The water remained either too low or fast moving for insects that lay eggs in water. There were no signs of deer that I could find, but there were many many signs of squirrel. As we walked through the small creek, we noticed that it was actually part of a low ravine. We marked how there were only deciduous trees/ leaving trees. Most of the ground was fertile with plants, and there were plenty of young trees growing, though, I noticed there were very few large trees. Unfortunately there weren't any people in the forest to talk to. The one lady walking her dog as we came I the creek looked rather unfriendly, and also walked very fast away from us. We did notice that somewhat deep into the woods, we actually came back into parts of Josh's neighborhood. Rather, we came into an area that had a house being built. Josh had remembered one of his friends saying he was building a house in Josh's area, and so we assumed it to be him. This was confirmed when we saw him walk out of the house taking a call on the phone.
It was interesting for me to see what exactly there was to notice in an area, especially one I had thought I already knew fairly well. Single parts I hadn't explored turned out to be fairly interesting, and also depressingly low on natural resources. I guess that's the result of urbanization. Regardless, I still have the desire to do a full reenactment of the Louis and Clark journey, and I already know I have to take Josh. Its a great thing, the spirit of adventure.
