Columbia Bottoms Conservation

While on a genealogy adventure, we visited Columbia Bottoms Conservation area. My ancestor John Graham lived down by the island on the map above, but Columbia Bottoms is up in the portion near the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers (where the bend is). While in North County, we also visited Spanish Lake pictured below.
It's a St. Louis County Park with trails and fishing---it's one of the few natural lakes in St. Louis and was a wonderful landmark which helped me find where John Graham lived since that island is no longer in the Mississippi, but Spanish Lake is on the map and is in the same spot.
While I expected to see trails, and bottom land in the conservation area, I did not expect art. Scattered throughout the area, there are kiosk-type structures which have explanations of what you're looking at, but each includes beautiful mosaics. The one above is the confluence that looks like a bird and shows white birds flying down this wonderful fly path down the center of the county.

Here's one by a field---even the back side was decorated on each kiosk.

Well, we didn't see any turtles here, but we saw this:
This "kiosk" (below) shows the levels when the rivers have flooded. The 1993 flood had water at the top of the pole next to Dave.
It was so exciting to know that my ancestors lived so close to where Lewis and Clark came through. I wonder if they got to meet them. But according to the quote, the residents met up with them. . .so, maybe.
One John Graham did have legal documents in Merriwether Lewis's papers---we aren't sure if it was OUR John Graham or not. (Double click to enlarge any photo)
The map below helped a lot---it shows what the river looked like when Lewis and Clark came through versus what it looks like now. See that tiny island below the confluence (just below the Columbia Bottoms sign) that isn't there anymore---the river moved.

Double click above to read about Lewis and Clark---it you need a brief refresher.
This area above that's underwater is the Edward Jones Confluence Park. Click here and look under "Conservation" to see the park and where we were standing at Columbia Bottoms. We went to the Confluence Park several years ago with Mom---when it's not flooded there are benches, a walkway and it is very easy to see the two rivers merging---they are different colors.
Just to the south of Columbia Bottom is Bird Island where there's a bald eagle's nest---it's a dark spot in the tree about a third of the way from the left.
From there, I made Dave stop at each and every kiosk. . .I'm turning into my parents. . .

Please double click on the ones with writing---especially if you want to know what this area was like when Lewis and Clark came through this area. . .and my ancestor John Graham who settled here in 1797.


Although we didn't see much wildlife, I wished I'd had a tape recorder for the sounds of the frogs, birds, ducks and fish that we couldn't always see and the rustle of the cottonwood trees. . .a beautiful day with a wonderful balance of history, family history and natural history.