Yes, there will be a fourth! After much drinking deliberation, we decided our next epic cheap car cross-country challenge would be to recreate The Oregon Trail, inspired by the video game we all know and love — which I researched as a computer history icon as we played it. And after a badly needed rematch, I started looking into the people and places mentioned in the game. (And at least one reader must watch some of either playthru because of how damn long they took to edit.)
- Taylor, Carpenter, 3270 points, 2 casualties (including Evan), good health (but only at the end…)
- George, Banker, 2199 points, 0 casualties (showoff), fair health
- Evan, Banker, 1007 points, 3 casualties (including Taylor), fair health
In short, across three games: I won, but it was treacherous. George died of dysentery. Evan is probably our best keyboard-rifleman, but he killed me in a river crash.
Having crossed the great virtual plains thrice, we figured ourselves expert enough to start some route planning of our own.
We overlaid the official NPS Oregon National Historic Trail (red line, which the game is quite faithful to) with a pair of detours we wanted to add (Black Hills NF/Badlands NP and Craters of the Moon NM).
Then we booked a whole lot of places to stay. I’m excited to report that for the most part, they seem like interesting spots (our only generic hotel stay at least has a water park in the lobby). We also absolutely peppered the map with points of interest, parks, historical markers, quirky attractions, and places where you can still see the old wagon ruts from the mid-1800s migration.
And… I started reading books about the Oregon Trail (the historic migration, not the video game), which is quite a new leaf for me to have turned over.
I also figured out how to work Hastings Cutoff (of Donner-Reed Party Disaster note) into my route: from Fort Bridger, I’ll make a detour down to Salt Lake City to pick up Evan G on Hastings Cutoff, which was later developed into The Mormon Pioneer Trail, carrying Mormon migrants from The Oregon Trail in Wyoming down into Utah.
Once we finalized our stopovers and I did a little more web development, we turned our attention to wagon-ry! As we did for the AlCan, we again decided to buy local. The lingering effects the pandemic (and the following boom and recession) disrupted what we knew of of the bottom-dollar jalopy market; namely, everything is much more expensive and in worse repair. So having more time to buy and fix ahead of time is super helpful. Before long, George and I struck gold the same night — wagons acquired. Two anyway… and there was much angst from our wagonless comrade until he, too, found… something.
And we’re again keeping the cars secret from each other until we meet! So while details are thin at this point, a few things have been revealed:
- I bought in San Antonio, and the quest to get both cars up to Austin involved a train heist and raising the eyebrow of my office’s security guard.
- I may have gotten a much better deal than George. And the previous owner of George’s car made him promise to take good care of it. (He’s so screwed.)
- Evan may have bought a vehicle that was dead on a dealer lot for over a year, but the dealer was willing to cut the price in half to get rid of it.
- On a particularly dark weekend, George kept running into “surprise jobs” while Evan toiled to figure out why his exhaust manifold gets so hot it glows and my wagon became undriveable.
- We’re all better now: with Evan declaring that he won’t need to buy a replacement car. I kinda addressed my calamity with a junkyard part. And George did some car work with his Dad (and made us a swanky dinner reservation for our reunion night).
- Then, with one last weekend to prepare, the picture began looking somewhat less rosy. George said, “Okay, so I think my final score for tonight is 2x ‘I MENDED SOMETHING’ and only one ‘I MADE SOMETHING ELSE WORSE.’ There’s a new noise, but I am choosing to believe it’s not important.” Evan said, “The old problem is I thought the steering wheel was off-center and needed alignment… But turns out its off-centerness changes based on which way I turned most recently. So uhh… That isn’t ideal.” And I have some waterproofing and tire concerns — and finally decided to just replace that stupid part from a dealer.
And realizing it had been a while since we’d spoken of the game, I found an ancient article identifying some of the music featured in the 1990 PC-DOS release of The Oregon Trail and collected it into a Spotify playlist. I assume no one will listen to it (it’s not exactly my style either), but it was fun to do the digging.
Then against all logical decision-making, on top of a heavy week work and wild last-minute migration prep…
I bought Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom which I absolutely do not have time to play, but absolutely must. So I put my Nintendo in my bookbag (which again, surprising us all, has actual books in it), too.
And finally, nearly a year into the planning, at the end of a remarkably hectic day, with just 48 hours until we meet in Independence, Missouri, I set off on a rural adventure of my own through northeast Texas, safely making it to my halfway stopover in Texarkana. We meet in Independence tonight.
Now nothing remains to be done, but to notice the method of traveling, which I shall proceed to do, with as much brevity as is consistent with the importance of the subject. Emigrants should, invariably, arrive at Independence, Missouri on, or before, the fifteenth day of April, so as to be in readiness to enter upon their journey, on or before, the first day of May; after which time, they should never start if it can possibly be avoided. The advantages to be derived from setting out at as early a day as that above suggested, are those of having an abundance of good pasturage in passing over those desolate and thirsty plains, and being enabled to cross the mountains before the falling of mountains of snow, or floods, or rain, which usually occurs in that region early in October. Before leaving the rendezvous, emigrants should always organize, by dividing into such companies, and electing such officers, as shall be deemed necessary.
Lansford W. Hastings, The Emigrants’ Guide to Oregon and California. Collected in “Oregon Trail Stories” (David Klausmeyer). (Yes, that Hastings, and yes, this is an excerpt from his famous guidebook that was often carried by emigrant trains.)
