The California Trail followed the Oregon Trail to the Snake River valley.
From here set off south into what is modern Utah and the Great Salt Lake, and then on to what is now Nevada, before striking west to find the Humboldt Valley over the Sierra Nevada mountains.
Those going to Oregon had the Cascades before them, but the Columbia cut through them. The Sierra Nevada had no easy routes and its mountains are far taller and more rugged.
This route was to prove even more challenging than people could ever have imagined.
