Missoula, Montana

"Missoula, MT a recreation paradise in Big Sky Country"

Missoula, Montana, the second largest city in Montana is home of the University of Montana, world famous fly fishing and legendary white water river rafting.

Missoula is located near the Rattlesnake Wilderness and Rattlesnake National Recreation Area, two areas that protect Missoula's municipal watershed and serve as wildlife habitat and recreational areas. The Forest Service's smokejumper base, the largest of its kind, is located near the Missoula airport. Free tours of the base are popular with tourists during the summer wildfire season. A walking bridge over the downtown yards of the Montana RailLink railroad is a popular destination for railfans.

Adventure Cycling
Missoula is a focal point of bicycle travel, because of the presence of Adventure Cycling Association, North America's largest cycling membership organization. Thousands of bike travelers come through Missoula and stop at Adventure Cycling's downtown headquarters (in a former church at 150 E. Pine Street) for free ice cream, advice, and the chance to be photographed.

Missouola, Montana - MT Rafting and Whitewater
Whitewater Rafting | Easy Rafting | Wine Tasting Raft | Geocaching | Bird Watching |
White Water Classes | Team Building

History
American Indians from the Salish tribe inhabited Missoula first. The name "Missoula" is thought to come from the Salish (also known as Flathead) word nmesuletkʷ, the Salish name for the Clark Fork River.

Lewis and Clark
The Indians' first encounter with whites came in 1805 when the Lewis and Clark expedition passed through the Missoula Valley. There were no permanent white settlements in the Missoula Valley until 1860 when C.

Mullan Road - The "First" Trans-America Road
The completion of the Mullan Road connecting Fort Benton, Montana with Walla Walla, Washington and passing through the Missoula Valley meant fast growth for the burgeoning city, buoyed by the U.S. Army's establishment of Fort Missoula in 1877, and the arrival of the Northern Pacific Railroad in 1883.

Glacial Lake Missoula
During the last Ice Age, a lobe of the Cordilleran Ice Sheet blocked the Clark Fork river near what is now Clark Fork, Idaho. The resulting lake, Glacial Lake Missoula, extended approximately 320 kilometers (200 mi) eastward, filling the Missoula Valley. Its former shorelines can now be seen as horizontal lines on nearby mountains.[10]

Logging remained a mainstay industry with log yards throughout the city until the 1970s. Many ran teepee burners to dispose waste material, contributing to the smoky haze that sometimes covered the town. However, by the early 1990s, changes in the economic fortunes in the city had shut down all the Missoula log yards.

With the loss of the log yards, other industries, such as tourism, have arisen. Missoula is located within the flyfishing Golden Triangle and is a popular area for outdoor activities including hunting, skiing, and camping. is water. Missoula is located in a deep valley in the western part of the state, near where the Clark Fork River is joined by the Bitterroot and Blackfoot Rivers.

U of M
Missoula is home to the main campus of the University of Montana. There are four public high schools: Hellgate High School, Sentinel High School, Big Sky High School, and Willard Alternative High School. There are also several private schools: Missoula International School, Sussex School, Valley Christian School, Loyola Sacred Heart High School, Clark Fork School and Next Step Prep, a performing arts high school opened in 2009 by Missoula Children's Theatre.

The city is frequently mentioned in novels of Ernest Hemingway, Stephen Frey, Chuck Palahniuk, James Lee Burke, James Crumley, and former resident Norman Maclean. In his novel, A River Runs Through It, Maclean wrote that "The world is full of bastards, the number increasing rapidly the further one gets from Missoula, Montana."