I didn’t have an inkling of just how bad the Lewis and Clark expedition had it during the winter of 1806 until I stood shivering at the canoe landing, on the river that now bears the explorers’ names, and squinted into a wind-driven squall out of the west.

Two hundred years ago – Jan. 21, 1806 – Lewis had described the sweet root of the thistle in his journals. I can picture the captain ruminating over the ”shugary” taste, pen in hand, while listening to the rain pelting the roof of his rude log quarters at Fort Clatsop.

Winter near the mouth of the Columbia is cold, sodden, beautiful but bleak. Standing there in the elements, I imagined the Corps of Discovery negotiating the big river in their crude dugout canoes, thought about them cobbling together their ”fort” amid the constant rain. When it got too uncomfortable out there, Clark, Lewis and the 31 others put their backs into it and cut more logs. We trudged back to the car and cranked the heat.

The Corps of Discovery arrived at the mouth of the Columbia River on Nov. 7, 1805. A month later, members of the expedition began building their winter encampment, which provided shelter for three-and-a-half months. Of the 106 days they spent at Fort Clatsop, it rained every day but 12, sickness was rampant and a flea infestation drove the crew to distraction.

Things are downright cushy at the fort today. These days, it’s a fascinating place to while away an afternoon.

Now a joint venture between the National Park Service and the states of Oregon and Washington, Fort Clatsop National Memorial consists of a visitor center and trails in roughly the same spot that the corps camped. The replica fort burned down last year. All that was left there when I visited was a foundation. I saw the replica a few years ago, and while it was a fascinating recreation, there’s something to be said for relying on your imagination. In that empty clearing in those woods on that cold day, I could just about hear the appropriate voices echoing through the rain forest.

But alas, it was my wife, beckoning from down the trail. She’d happened upon a pair of canoes on a grassy spot near the river from which the band of explorers must have come and gone. Other than the wood-paved path here at Netul Landing, what we were seeing was probably what they saw. That’s exciting stuff.

Before venturing out to explore, though, you’ll want to catch the 22-minute film about the expedition’s time on the Oregon coast. Told from the viewpoint of the native Clatsop Indians, the video offers the foundation upon which your imagination can run free.

An exhibit inside the visitor center also relates the Lewis and Clark saga through words, art and artifacts.

The Lewis and Clark National Historical Park, of which Fort Clatsop is a part, also includes several other sites in and around the town of Astoria that were important to the expedition. They include:

* Clark’s Dismal Nitch, the cove on the Columbia where expedition members hunkered down for six days and rode out a howling November storm before going on to build the fort.

* Station Camp, also on the Washington side of the Columbia River, is where the Corps of Discovery got its first glimpse of the Pacific Ocean.

* The Fort to Sea Trail offers a six-mile hike from Fort Clatsop to the Pacific Ocean at Sunset Beach. It follows the route the crew members probably followed going to and from the coast.

* The Salt Works at Seaside is a reconstruction of the expedition’s salt-making activity.

* Cape Disappointment State Park marks the farthest westward point Lewis and Clark ventured. It’s on the Washington side near the town of Ilwaco.

A highlight of our tour of the northern Oregon coast was Fort Stevens State Park. It’s located near the mouth of the Columbia on the site of an early Clatsop Indian village that was thriving when Lewis and Clark wintered nearby. The fort was built in 1864 to guard the strategic mouth of the river.

On June 21, 1942, Fort Stevens became the only military installation in the continental United States to have been fired upon by a foreign power since the War of 1812. That night, a Japanese submarine fired 17 shells at the fort. Gunners at the fort did not fire back.

The other must-see at Fort Stevens is the wreck of the Peter Iredale. The ship, originally a 278-foot sailing vessel, was 28 days out of Salina Cruz, Mexico, headed for Portland when it foundered on the shore of Clatsop Beach on Oct. 25, 1906. A good bit of it is still there, to touch and to photograph.

Fort Clatsop National Memorial is about five miles south of Astoria. Fort Stevens State Park is near the mouth of the Columbia River, a few miles west of Astoria. Cost is $3 per person for forts Clatsop and Stevens.

Contact: Fort Clatsop at 503-861-2471, Fort Stevens at 503-861-1671.