July 8, 2016

The Northwest Passage Scenic Byway is part of the Lewis and Clark Trail. Technically, it is US Rte. 12. I can see why Lewis and Clark chose US Rte. 12: it is a two-lane road with pretty good pavement, and the lack of shoulders was probably inconsequential in their day. The road parallels the Lochsa and Clearwater Rivers west of the Lolo Pass.

​Today, I drove The Northwest Passage Scenic Byway between Clarkston, WA and Lolo, MT where I picked up US Rte. 93 north to Polson, MT. US Rte. 12 traverses the Nez Perce reservation, and US. Rte. 93 traverses the Flathead reservation north of Missoula. Neither the Nez Perce nor the Flatheads had a written language, yet there are brown road signs spelling out the tribal names of rivers, valleys, lakes, etc. Often, there is a superscript "w" in many place names. For example, The Flathead River is ntx̣ʷetkʷ, ntx̣ʷe and Flathead Lake is člq̓etkʷ in Salish. How do you say that? Also, note the lack of similarity between the names: that means the Flatheads didn’t use the word “Flathead” in their names for the places. If I discovered a language which was only spoken and not written, I would hire the people who invented "Hooked on Phonics" to create the Roman script. I would not hire the people who invented Welsh to do it. Further, if the Indians called a place "The Little Valley behind the Hills," I would call it that, too: I wouldn’t rename it Evaro when their name was perfectly clear.