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Westward Ho!

We left Cincinnati on Sunday, June 9, 2025, to continue our year on the road after a few months’ hiatus. Since we had such a good time following the Natchez Trace last fall, we took our son Cyrus’s suggestion to follow the Oregon Trail out to Oregon. Like the Natchez Trace, there’s lots of historic markers and other things of interest to see. We’ve been on the road for a week now, and on the path of the Oregon Trail (more or less) for five days. Here’s what we’ve seen so far.


A Conestoga wagon, used by travelers on the
Oregon Trail, is just a bit bigger than our Scamp camper

First day, we drove down the hill to the Ohio River and turned right onto U.S. 50, which we know as River Road. My sister Amy had given us some basil plants to take with us—fresh herbs are always nice, especially basil, it goes in everything! We followed U.S. 50 through Indiana and Illinois, stopping at the Pizza Palace in Seymour, Indiana, for lunch. We made it to Carlyle, Illinois, and stayed on the shores of Lake Carlyle in the western part of the state. Perfectly nice lake, we walked down to see more of it. It is big, and a lot of people keep their sailboats there. We stopped in Carlyle because that put us about an hour out of St. Louis, so we could get through the city after rush hour the next day.


Traveling with fresh basil

And that’s what we did, we saw the Gateway Arch as we approached and crossed the Mississippi, and then drove straight through the city on the south side, since the ring road we were planning to take was closed for construction. But we picked a good time, mid-morning on a Monday, and got through pretty easily. I must remark on a business we saw in the near St. Louis suburbs. It was called the Uranus Fudge Factory, and their slogan, I kid you not, was “The best fudge comes from Uranus.” I am really surprised they were allowed to put that on a sign on a highway, but I swear we saw it. Still shaking my head about that.

Then we spent the rest of the day almost crossing Missouri, still on U.S. 50, and sped through the capital city, Jefferson City. It looked like a nice small town. Not too far past the capital, we came to the only state park we could find that was near the highway, Knob Noster, which our limited Latin told us meant “Our Knob.” And indeed, that is what the town was named. According to legend, the Indians in the area told the first settlers that they had buried their warriors in the small hill, or knob, that was near the town. So, I guess to sanctify it, they named it half in Latin.

In any event, it was a lovely park, and we spent two nights there. I had some work to do, so I set up my computer under the trees and that was quite nice. It was right next to Whiteman Air Force Base, which a friend of Mike’s told him was a phone booth base, a place for pilots to stop, have lunch, and make a phone call. It was quite small, but from the campground we could hear them play reveille at 7:30 am (we appreciated that it wasn’t too early), the Star-Spangled Banner at 5:00 pm, and Taps at sunset. One night when we were camped in Knob Noster, the skies were clear and we saw the full moon.


Me, working in the woods

Now we were only about an hour out of Kansas City. Again, we planned to get their mid-morning, but I guess Wednesdays are busier, the traffic was pretty crazy. But we got through and into Kansas, where we veered off on Kansas 10, leaving U.S. 50 behind us. Though we didn’t stop in Independence or St. Joseph, two of the starting points for pioneers heading west, we did see the first major landmark on the Oregon Trail as we approached Lawrence, Kansas, on the 10. It was called Blue Mound, and it’s a 1,000-foot or so hill that stands out on the plains. The folks who headed out on the Trail would often climb it to see the view afforded from the height of the surrounding territory they were going to travel.

North and west of Lawrence, but a bit east of Topeka, we stopped to camp at Lake Perry State Park, a few miles off U.S. 24, which we had picked up in Lawrence and which follows the old path of the Trail for a bit. We drove to a nearby town called Meriden for BBQ brisket, and it was good. After getting back to the campsite, we began to plot our stops as we started along the easternmost portion of the Oregon Trail (which was also the California Trail at that point). Westward, ho!

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