On August 21, 1804, Lewis and Clark wrote that they set out very early and proceeded under a gentle breeze from the southeast, passing Willow Creek (Perry Creek) on the starboard side below a bluff about 170 feet high and one-half mile above Floyd's River, and then, 1 1/2 miles higher and above the bluff, passed the Soues River on the starboard side. In 1803, President Tomas Jefferson sent an expedition commanded by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark to explore the newly acquired Louisiana Purchase, seek an all-water route to the Pacific Ocean, and make peaceable contact with native peoples. The explorers headed up the Missouri on May 14, 1804, reached the Pacific in November 1805, and returned to St. Louis on September 12, 1806, after traveling more than 8000 miles in two years, four months and nine days. The Motor Vessel "Sgt. Floyd" was constructed at the Howard Shipyard of Jeffersonville, Indiana, and launched on May 31, 1932. It was used by the Missouri Division of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers as a survey and inspection vessel and spent many years following the water trail of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. It is now a tourism center and river museum with displays on the Lewis and Clark Expedition and on the history and use of the Missouri River through the years.