The Parowan Gap Road continues east to Cedar City where Alonzo notes, “We have now struck the Old Spanish Trail . . . We shall probably follow this trail 2 or 3 hundred miles.”
The Spanish Trail followed a route south toward Cedar City, west of I-15. We backtracked on the Parowan Gap Road to Hwy 130 and drove south. My original intent had been to see the Shakespeare Theater in Cedar City, but that was not to be on this trip.
A little over fifty miles along the Spanish Trail from Little Salt Lake Alonzo wrote in his journal, “Our noon halt was on a little stream and to our astonishment we found a party of men. Not Fremont and his starving party in the mountains but Capt Smith and his party of men almost perished with hunger. Oh horror I pity the poor souls. They have been necessitated to kill and eat 11 mules and horses to sustain life. . . . The company attempted to make a cut off, and got lost in the Mts. From the Spanish Trail.”
At Iron Springs the trail runs northwest around the Antelope Range and then south to present day Newcastle. It is probably in the area north of Newcastle that they met Captain Smith’s group. We drove west on Hwy 56 where we met the Spanish Trail at Newcastle and turned south on Hwy 18.
It was just south of this area that Alonzo recorded, “All well but cold, the thermometer stood this morning at 11 below zero. That is rather cold. We are between 6 and 7 thousand feet above the Gulf of Mexico.”
The highway follows the Spanish Trail very closely all the way south to Littlefield AZ. After reading Alonzo’s experiences on this part of the trail, I had been concerned about the weather. Since this road followed the trail so closely, this section, more than any other, was the one I wanted to be able to follow. We also knew that a major storm was due to arrive that night that would bring two to three feet of snow to the mountains.
The weather was cold but clear and we traveled an excellent two-lane road. Our first stop was Mountain Meadow where the Pomeroy group found ample feed and water for the stock. At Alonzo’s time it was simply a large meadow that was a good camping place on the trail.
On December 10, 1849, Alonzo describe the area, ”Laid over all well. Encamped in a small valley of high altitude, Mts all around very rugged and high. I went with the herd today some 4 miles to water them at the east fork of Santa Clara, a beautiful small steam of clear and sparkling water. Mirth and jollity pervades the camp.”
Later, Mountain Meadow became famous because of a large massacre that occurred there in 1857. Known as the Mountain Meadow Massacre, an incident still controversial today, it involved an emigrant group from Arkansas and local Mormons. Anyone interested in knowing more about it can find information on the Internet.
At Veyo Hwy 18 runs southeast to St. George UT. Old Highway 91 follows the Old Spanish Trail and it immediately makes a couple of hairpin turns and rapidly descends. “Alonzo describes it, “We go downhill tremendously today. The first 5 miles we decended some 1200 feet or more. Almost to another climate since we crossed the rim of the Great Basin . . . This I should think was God’s chosen romantic retreat. It is sublime grand, and terrific in its structure. We are traveling down the bed of the Santa Clara.”
Santa Clara River
We traveled toward Gunlock and the state park where the mountain landscape is spectacular and the rock formations are brilliant red. It was near here that Alonzo mentions doing some blacksmithing and helping shoe some oxen. The rocky ground was very hard on the animal’s feet.
The summit, Utah Hill, found Alonzo up to his knees in snow. We were more fortunate and had a beautiful vista looking north toward the Beaver Dam Mountains, the Red Mountains, and the Bull Valley Mountains.
From the summit the road descends toward the Rio Virgin, a tributary of the Colorado River. The journal reads, “One hours drive this morning, we were in a valley where there was no snow and warm climate. Our road was a beautiful one today. Descending gradually and rapidly it does seem, and I hope we have left the hardest cold weather behind us. Poor oxen are hungry and no feed. We are in the desert country. The waters of the Virgin makes good coffee. Encamped on the Rio Virgin.”
It was not much different 160 years later except we didn’t stop to make coffee and we encamped very reasonably at a lovely hotel overlooking the Rio Virgin in Mesquite, NV.
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