The Oregon Trail Interpretive Center, Baker City, ORJul 7, 2012
|
|
RV Park lineup
this year's 'garden' with butterfly
Wagon train exhibit
| I’m camped at Oregon Trail West RV Park in Baker City, OR. I stopped here in Baker City for the sole purpose of seeing the Oregon Trail Interpretive Center. I love the history of the Oregon Trail and have read much about it. So I was eager to visit this Interpretive Center. I didn’t know quite what to expect but the Center did not let me down. I was thrilled. For the most part I’ll let the pictures show you some of the Center. The National Historic Oregon Trail Interpretive Center features extensive self-guided exhibits with life-sized trail scenes, pioneer figures, replica wagons, wildlife and many artifacts. Three videos helped me further understand what happened on the trail; these videos were set in a room with complimenting scenery on the walls and places to sit. All was sub-titled. The videos just added to the reality of the journey. The life-sized wagon trains were fascinating as most of the people looked real, the animals were stuffed, real animals and there were stories to go along with each wagon scene—frustrating though because I couldn’t figure out how to activate the stories. The journey included a periodic timeline of how far the travelers were from Independence, MO and how much progress they’d made toward Oregon City. It was a great place I went to 2 days for 2-3 hours. I also enjoyed listening to a trio singing folk songs. I was only about 5 miles from the Center, so that made it easy to go back there today and look and listen some more. I did try to find wagon ruts, but given the heat [90’s], I didn’t look long and gave up. The ‘ruts’ aren’t really like car ruts. The rut is wide with the outside of the ‘rut’ being made by the wagon wheels and the middle flattened by the oxen or horses. I leave tomorrow very glad that I had made this stop. I’m leaving the state of Oregon and on to Idaho. |
Advertisement 
|
