Farewell Bend

Hunt's Astorians reached this stretch of the Snake in December 1811 already starving, after the river's canyons had wrecked their canoes and their plan. Washington Irving's account, drawn from Hunt's journal, has the men living on a single meal of horse flesh a day and buying horse meat from Shoshone families scarcely better off. In those weeks one man, ferried across the river in a skin canoe toward meat roasting on the far bank, danced so hard he upset the boat. On December 24 Hunt turned away from the Snake toward the Blue Mountains.

What the plaque says

Historic Oregon Trail Farewell Bend The last camp on the weary journey across the Snake River plains. Here the Oregon Trail left the Snake River and wound overland to the Columbia. Here camped Wilson Price Hunt, December 23, 1811; Capt. Bonneville, January 10, 1834; Nathaniel J. Wyeth, August 25, 1834; Lt. John C. Fremont, October 13, 1843.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Weiser — 13 mi
  Every June the fiddlers come to a farm town on the Snake, and the campground plays all night.

More markers nearby

• 11,000 Years of Indian Occupation — 14 mi
• Francois Payette — 22 mi
• Durkee — 22 mi
• An Early Industry — 23 mi