Lyons Ferry at the juncture of the Palouse and Snake rivers in southeast Washington gave its name to this historic river crossing point and the Lyons Ferry State Park where the Sea Lion anchored. Here, we explored with our Zodiac rafts and kayaks into the adjoining canyon waterway and took a short ride by school bus to the great punchbowl where Palouse Falls spills amid its mist and rainbows. Lt. John Mullan of the U.S. Army Topographical Engineers in 1858 laid out the first military wagon road to connect the Pacific Northwest from the coast eastward over the Continental Divide into the upper Missouri country.The road ran 624 miles from Ft. Walla Walla, Wash., to Fort Benton, Mont. Lyons Ferry was the means of crossing the lower Snake River.
The ferry was powered by the river current and ran from bank to bank on a cable and pulley system. Behind the historic ferry are Lombard poplar and honey locust trees that shade visitors to this park oasis in an otherwise treeless landscape. When Lewis and Clark camped here Oct. 13, 1805, they had to scrounge for driftwood along the riverbank, as the surroundings are all shrub-steppe grassland.
Every May the park trees are a magnet for neotropic birds that compete noisily for territory--Western tanagers, Western kingbirds and Bullock's orioles.
