Following the Oregon Trail - Chimney Rock to Fort Laramie
Did you play the Oregon Trail game when you were a kid? I always died somewhere in the middle, usually of dysentery, and I have to say I recently tried to play and had a similar result... I usually played it a friend's house, so it was kind of exciting to visit some of the sites in Western Nebraska and Wyoming that show up in the game. When I was a kid, I really had no idea where the places were. Despite the fact that Nebraska is not necessarily a top travel destination for many, it was an interesting area to spend a day.
Chimney Rock was one of the first major landmarks that people on the Oregon Trail saw on their trek. There is a small visitor's center at Chimney Rock National Historic Site, which is run by the Nebraska State Historic Society. There's a movie and a few displays and a view of the rock. There has been lots of erosion and there is lots of speculation on how long Chimney Rock will hold up, but it's still there for now.
Scotts Bluff National Monument, about 25 miles west of Chimney Rock is where the landscape really starts to change. There's a small visitor's center with a trail and road to the top of the bluff. The trail to the top is closed in the middle right now, due to a rockslide, but you can hike part of the way from the bottom and part of the way from the top if you are looking for a hike. So after looking around the visitor's center, we took the road to the top, which goes through several tunnels. There are a couple of trails which have nice views of the surrounding landscape, including the badlands area.
Continuing west into Wyoming, the next stop is Fort Laramie National Historic Site, about 60 miles from Scottsbluff. It wasn't what I had pictured, as I was expecting a log fort. Originally Fort Laramie was a log palisade, but was rebuilt with adobe walls. It started as a trading post, and then became a military outpost when it was purchased by the army in the mid-1800's. Some of the buildings have been restored, which have been staged and some have been left as ruins. And when traffic on the Oregon Trail started, it was a place to buy more supplies.
The final stop on our Oregon Trail adventure, was Guernsey, WY, not too far west of Fort Laramie. The Guernsey Ruts, which are worn nearly 5 feet deep in places, were pretty interesting to see. I was imagining trains of wagons actually traveling through.
And very close by, is Register Cliff, a spot where many people carved their name on the cliffs and still do today. It took a minute to pick out some of the older carvings, but they are there, along with lots of swallows nests.
