During the late 19th century, thousands of Americans left farms, families, and friends to travel the Oregon Trail toward new lives in the West. The trail stretched nearly 2,000 miles across prairies, mountains, and parched deserts, and it was not a single set of parallel ruts leading from Missouri to the Willamette Valley. Pioneers, always searching for shortcuts or easier travel, often followed alternative routes, and on the western part of the journey they developed several, including the Barlow Road, the path across the Columbia Plateau, and the South Alternate Route along the Snake River. Native Americans had traveled the course of the Snake River for centuries before fur trappers learned of the route in the early 1800s, and they passed that knowledge to westbound emigrants. By 1843, and for nearly thirty years afterward, wagon trains followed the Snake River watershed from Fort Hall to Three Island Crossing near the town of Glens Ferry, Idaho. From this crossing, some wagon companies forded the Snake River to the north bank, while others followed the south bank. Those taking the South Alternate Route avoided two crossings of the Snake River and one of the Boise River, but the hot, dry, dusty trail was more difficult than the northern route and took a heavy toll on emigrants and livestock.