The route of Captain Clark from the point where he and Captain Lewis divided their party, was rather more difficult than that pursued by the Lewis detachment.

But the Clark party was larger, being composed of twenty men and Sacajawea and her baby.

They were to travel up the main fork of Clark's River (sometimes called the Bitter Root), to Ross's Hole, and then strike over the great continental divide at that point by way of the pass which he discovered and which was named for him; thence he was to strike the headwaters of Wisdom River, a stream which this generation of men knows by the vulgar name of Big Hole River; from this point he was to go by the way of Willard's Creek to Shoshonee Cove and the Two Forks of the Jefferson, and thence down that stream to the Three Forks of the Missouri, up the Gallatin, and over the divide to the Yellowstone and down that river to its junction with the Missouri, where he was to join the party of Captain Lewis.

This is the itinerary that was exactly carried out.

The very first incident set forth in the journal is a celebration of Independence Day, as follows:-- "Friday, July 4.