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Black Robe posted:That seems like quite a lot of stuff to have lost in not much over knee-deep water. You can drown in 1.5 feet of water on a bad roll.
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May 12, 2019 22:28
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Black Robe posted:That seems like quite a lot of stuff to have lost in not much over knee-deep water.  
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May 12, 2019 22:36
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Yeah the supplies were "lost".  I learned how they made coffee in the wild west from a Lucky Luke comic. First you wet half a kg of coffee in a bit of water and boil it for 30 minutes. Then you add a horseshoe. If the horseshoe doesn't float you add more coffee.
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May 12, 2019 22:43
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Black Robe posted:That seems like quite a lot of stuff to have lost in not much over knee-deep water. Anything that gets wet is potentially contaminated and has to be thrown out.
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May 12, 2019 22:44
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In 183X? Nope.
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May 12, 2019 22:56
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They should have used a clean sock when making coffee.
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May 12, 2019 23:24
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Dirty socks add more flavor though
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May 12, 2019 23:33
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SelenicMartian posted:Odell Lake? Yes! I've been trying for a long time to remember that name.
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May 12, 2019 23:57
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ultrafilter posted:Anything that gets wet is potentially contaminated and has to be thrown out. Hazardous as rivers are in this game, this wagon train's going to California. Water will be a precious, precious thing if we get that far.
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May 13, 2019 00:03
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SelenicMartian posted:Odell Lake? Shoutouts to Lunar Greenhouse, Midnight Rescue, and the original Carmen Sandiego
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May 13, 2019 03:16
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I remember when the general TFR chat thread was called “Don’t mix up your coffee sock with your lonely sock.”
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May 13, 2019 04:49
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Amazingly, New Santa Fe has no grandfather clocks or laudanum! I even checked the drug store. I guess previous travelers bought them all..png) The going is a little slower as the trail gets muddy. After 6 days we've traveled 55 miles and made it to Blue Mound. Today there's a tiny township with less than 500 people here. Back in 1850, the only thing of note is this big hill that looks kinda blue when viewed from afar. .png) It's a cold, foggy trip. As far as I can tell there's absolutely no benefit to slowing down or stopping in fog or dust. It just slows you down for no reason. .png) The river is fairly deep, though not super wide. We might be able to caulk and float across, but we could also just pay to take the ferry.
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May 13, 2019 15:24
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We're loaded, and have great hunting and foraging skills. Take the ferry.
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May 13, 2019 15:36
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We'll have plenty of time to drown later. When no-one's watching and laughing. Take the ferry.
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May 13, 2019 15:42
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Might as well spend a little cash to (hopefully) save on losing any more bacon or coffee. Take the ferry.
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May 13, 2019 15:58
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How much bacon and coffee would 6.35 get us? We should run detailed cost vs risk analysis on every decision.
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May 13, 2019 16:05
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Nothing bad could possibly happen from fording the river.
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May 13, 2019 16:33
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I think taking the ferry whenever possible is best.
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May 13, 2019 16:36
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Stop caulk-blocking and float across
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May 13, 2019 16:38
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This would set a dangerous precedent that ferries, and bridges, are in any way natural or correct. We should not encourage such immoral behavior. Ford it like god intended.
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May 13, 2019 16:49
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Ferries are an excellent way to waste money now so we have tighter decisions to make at trading posts later.
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May 13, 2019 17:10
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Ferry. We're a gunsmith, we have cash.
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May 13, 2019 17:18
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1UuvPzO4rM Taking the ferry means no muss, no fuss. .png) The next landmark we pass at the 121-mile mark is St. Mary's Mission in Kansas. You may notice that despite crossing from Missouri to Kansas we never saw Kansas City. This major metropolis wouldn't be founded until June 1st and it wouldn't become the City of Kansas with a population of 2500 until 1853. At the moment there's nothing but the small towns we just passed through. A settlement would slowly congregate around the mission, resulting in the city of St. Marys, KS being officially laid out in 1866. While the original mission building no longer exists, a pay station built in 1855 to pay an annuity to Pottawatomie natives who had moved there from the Great Lakes is still around as a museum.
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May 13, 2019 17:20
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Jimmy seems like he's an rear end in a top hat
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May 13, 2019 17:24
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RBA Starblade posted:Jimmy seems like he's an rear end in a top hat You'll find out later that Jimmy is a complete idiot.
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May 13, 2019 17:29
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One more update before I leave for work..png) With a toll of only a dollar, it's a trivial decision to take the bridge. .png) Scott Spring is today part of the St. Marys city limits. They have a small park with a replica wagon and some oxen statues. During the time of the Oregon Trail, legends say the place was absolutely filled with camps as travelers passed by and gathered water and wild edibles. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44hoxh3NvKI Jed here doesn't go into nearly as much detail as he should. We'll be dedicating a whole history post to these poor bastards.
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May 13, 2019 18:33
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Ain't no party like a Donner Party, cause at a Donner Party, everything's on the menu!
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May 13, 2019 18:55
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What does the "See who's around" option do? Also I vote for paying to cross rivers for as long as we're able - resupplying lost food will probably get harder as we progress
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May 13, 2019 19:31
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Yeah I agree, just pay the toll at any opportunity unless it's unreasonable. We have a couple thousand miles to go yet.
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May 13, 2019 19:56
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The Donner Party The Donner Party is the most infamous story to ever come out of the Oregon Trail. It's the story everyone knows, even if they know absolutely nothing else about the Oregon Trail beyond that it existed. It's the story of some of the most depraved conditions that any American has ever been subjected to. It's the story of people who did things that would haunt them for life if they lived long enough to make it back. To begin, it was more than just the Donners involved. In the spring of 1846 a train of almost 500 wagons took off for the west coast. At the rear of the train were the Reed and Donner families, led by 60-year-old George Donner, totaling 32 people heading to California. They lost one member, the 70-year-old Sarah Keyes, to tuberculosis on the way. They had some delays but made it to Fort Laramie in good time. As the video says, they had brought along the "Pioneer Palace", a gigantic two-story wagon with a cast iron stove and chimney, cushioned seats, and sleeping bunks. The problem was a shortcut. Lansford W. Hastings was one of the earlier emigrants to the west and wanted to further develop California. He proposed that a more direct route could be had by leaving the Oregon Trail, passing through the Wasatch Range, and crossing the Great Salt Lake Desert before rejoining the California Trail. As you can guess by the name "Great Salt Lake Desert", this may not have been the smartest route. Indeed, Hastings never traveled a single mile of his proposed route until just before the Donner Party arrived and had done it by himself without a wagon. The journey would require over 100 miles of travel through the undeveloped Sierra Nevada mountains, which are extremely steep and receive a ton of snowfall. Nevertheless, Hastings began sending letters out to travelers to encourage them to take the Hastings Cutoff. The Donner Party reached Blacks Fork on July 27 shortly after Hastings left with another wagon train. George Donner was a nice old American man so he was allowed to speak for the group, and when given advice on the Hastings Cutoff he gladly took it. The Donners and Reeds were relatively wealthy and lacked many pioneering skills, so when he was told that the Hastings Cutoff provided a smooth route with plenty of water except for about 30 or 40 miles across a dry lake bed he jumped on the opportunity. What they actually found was completely impassable territory. No roads had been developed, forcing the party to waste time on creating them. Hastings left letters stuck on trees advising them to stop and wait for him to turn around and help them find a better route than he had originally suggested, but they kept moving on at a slow pace of 1.5 miles per day. Some men rode ahead to try and meet Hastings but never found him and ended up nearly starving to death before the main wagons found them. Another member of the party died of TB right as they found another tattered letter from Hastings warning them that the worst was yet to come.  With no alternatives, they pressed on across the Great Salt Lake Desert. Over 6 days they traveled 80 miles across the completely barren desert, with hot days and frigid nights. The salt crust concealed mud that the wagons sank into up to their wheel hubs. They ran out of water and nearly died of dehydration, losing many animals to abandonment or escapes. And they still had a mountain range to cross. As tensions grew and they lost animals to violent Native Americans, James Reed tried to take control of the party. A fight on October 2 turned deadly when Reed stabbed a wagon driver to death, leading to him being banished; he ended up reaching Sutter's Fort after 22 days of travel. The parties splintered, everyone distrustful of every other wagon. They made it through the desert into the mountains after losing many animals and eating them to avoid starving...just in time for the snowfall.  The party was trapped by snowfall and made camp at Truckee Lake. Food ran out almost immediately, leaving them eating oxhide and bones. The inexperienced pioneers were barely able to hunt or fish and the Donners were as far as a day's walk away from the rest of the group. They turned on each other in ways that seem almost irrationally greedy; the Graves family charged the Eddy family $25 for the carcass of an ox that starved to death, then came back and took all of their remaining food to collect on the debt. They died one by one. A party of 17 men, women, and children set out (becoming 15 when they weren't able to make snowshoes for enough people) to try and get help. After running out of food they began proposing sacrifices, duels, and lotteries to decide who would die and be eaten. They eventually decided to just keep moving and see who died first. By the time of the third death, they had started eating the bodies. Eventually it progressed to survival of the fittest as they shot and killed the dying to eat them before they could starve. After 33 days on January 17, the seven survivors were found by a rescue party. Meanwhile, the exiled James Reed had been pleading for a rescue operation after it became apparent that the party was late. The Mexican-American War had sapped manpower from the fort, but they were able to get some volunteers. They arrived at Truckee Lake on February 18 to emaciated survivors, cabins buried in snow, and rotting oxhide roofs. The smell of decomposition filled the whole area. People continued to die on the journey back, especially children. George Donner had suffered a seemingly superficial wound while chopping wound months ago and his arm had gone gangrenous; he was unable to move from the pain and was left behind to die. It was discovered that the survivors at the camp had also resorted to cannibalism and Lewis Keseberg was suspected of murdering others to eat them. Of the 87 people who made it into the mountains, 48 made it out. Many children who survived were left orphans and William Eddy was the only survivor of his family. Keseberg was awarded $1 in a defamation lawsuit after the other members of the party accused him of murder, though he had to pay court costs. He eventually became a pariah from the widespread suspicion. The Hastings Cutoff was all but abandoned until 1847 when Brigham Young's group traveled through it and made substantial improvements to create a trail, though by 1850 the Salt Lake Cutoff would bypass the desert. Today the site can be visited as the Donner Memorial State Park. The legend of the Donner Party became widespread shortly after the survivors' arrival in California and is now one of the greatest lessons for any traveler on the Oregon Trail: don't take anything that's called a shortcut. chitoryu12 fucked around with this message at 05:47 on Jun 19, 2019 |
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May 13, 2019 20:21
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I... uh... vote we stick to the trail. 
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May 13, 2019 21:22
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Bootcha posted:When in doubt, eat.
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May 13, 2019 22:48
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chitoryu12 posted:It's a cold, foggy trip. As far as I can tell there's absolutely no benefit to slowing down or stopping in fog or dust. It just slows you down for no reason. Best I've ever been able to tell, fog and dust increase the chance of certain accidents happening while you travel. As for the Donner party, it's actually possible in OT2 to run into that same snowstorm in that same location and get an automatic special game over from it. This game goes out of its way to prevent you from doing that.
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May 13, 2019 23:22
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQ1ZOFNBL68 Dramatic re-enactment
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May 13, 2019 23:26
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Do we know what happened to Hastings? Or has he been lost to history?
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May 13, 2019 23:55
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inflatablefish posted:Do we know what happened to Hastings? Or has he been lost to history? He started as a lawyer before his failed attempt at being an adventurer (and he had somewhat of a reputation as an incompetent blowhard at the time of the Donner Party). He dreamed of starting an independent Republic of California with himself in a position of power, but the US easily took care of that by winning the Mexican-American War. He never left this dream behind and actually joined the Confederacy specifically to encourage Jefferson Davis to let him raise an army to conquer California and make it a Confederate state. That never even got off the ground. He was one of many Confederates who left the US to go to Brazil and began working with the Brazilian government on the resettlement, but died of yellow fever in the Virgin Islands in 1870. In short, nothing of value was lost.
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May 14, 2019 00:09
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chitoryu12 posted:It was discovered that the survivors at the camp had also resorted to cannibalism and Lewis Keseberg was suspected of murdering others to eat them. Or, as The Memory Palace put it: Nate DiMeo posted:Lewis Keseberg wasn't a good man. He cursed and he stole. He would drink and get into moods, and then get into fights. He beat his wife. He was cruel. Lewis Keseberg wasn't a good man ... but he didn't eat those people.
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May 14, 2019 00:27
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.png) We make a quick stop at alcove spring before our next visit. .png) It's a crowded day at the river. So many people are on the trail that we actually have to wait our turn to cross! .png) This one's a little deeper and trickier. Even with a careful choice, we could easily end up in trouble. But you know what? I feel like you guys haven't been learning enough. So let's pick some plants! .png) We have here a selection of foraged goods nearby. But you don't know anything about them except that they look like they might possibly be edible, at least more than the grass and bushes around them. They're each numbered 1 through 4 going clockwise from the top left (so that big cluster of red and black berries is 1). Choose what to keep and what to throw away using your own botany knowledge and best guesses! You'll be told the identity of any plants you pick. If you pick something poisonous, you won't know until you eat it.
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May 14, 2019 00:38
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Why do you think I need anything other than Bacon, Beans, Cornbread, and Coffee?  Should we be going by our own knowledge/intuition, or would looking stuff up be fair game?
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May 14, 2019 00:54
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Vavrek posted:Why do you think I need anything other than Bacon, Beans, Cornbread, and Coffee? I can’t stop you from Googling, but it’s more fun to do it on your own.
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May 14, 2019 00:58
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