‘The trail whispers’: Church historian joins Latter-day Saint youth on newly reopened 29-mile Wyoming pioneer trail

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has reopened a handcart trail for youth at its Wyoming Mormon Trail Historic Sites, allowing participants to pull handcarts along a 29-mile linear route that follows the original pioneer trail from Sixth Crossing over Rocky Ridge to Rock Creek Hollow.

After being halted due to the pandemic and other logistical complications, this trail is available for the first time in a decade, said Elder Kyle S. McKay, a General Authority Seventy who serves as Church historian and recorder and executive director of the Church History Department.

Elder McKay noted that walking these Wyoming trails enables members to connect with their ancestors and Church history, gaining insight into the challenges faced by handcart pioneers.

“This trail whispers,” he said. “There are those who have gone on before, and we listen to their stories, and we read their stories, and their testimony still reverberates in these sagebrush-covered hills.”

Elder McKay and his wife, Sister Jennifer S. McKay, accompanied 150 youth and leaders of the Hooper Utah Pioneer Trail Stake in walking the extended trail July 7-9. Information and photos of the trek were provided by ChurchofJesusChrist.org.

“I know the potential that this place has for providing an amazing experience,” Elder McKay said. “And so when we were finally able to open the trail back up, I wanted to be here.”

What drove them

Between the 1840s and 1860s, 70,000 Latter-day Saint pioneers journeyed to Salt Lake City, Utah. Ten pioneer companies traveled by handcart, with the Willie and Martin companies facing significant hardship.

Near Lander, Wyoming, the trail retraces the arduous route of nearly 400 pioneers from the Willie and Martin companies in fall 1856, who endured harsh weather and scarce resources until rescue wagons from Salt Lake City arrived.

Sixth Crossing is where the Willie Handcart Company encountered the first rescue wagons at the Sweetwater River amid early winter conditions in 1856.

A short time later, the Willie company sheltered at Rock Creek Hollow after the difficult ascent of Rocky Ridge — one of the highest points of altitude (7,300 feet) along the Oregon, Mormon and California trails — during a severe snowstorm.

Sister McKay said walking the trail helps one better understand the pioneers’ faith and perspective.

“What drove the people to do what they did was their love for God and their willingness to follow a prophet, and that is what drives us. We love our Heavenly Father. We want to let God prevail,” she said. “You can feel and you can see God at work in the lives of His children.”

The trek experience

President Robert Goates, Wyoming Mormon Trail Sites president, encouraged stakes, wards and branches to bring their young women and men to have this “unique experience.”

“They can walk where their ancestors walked. They can see the landscape that they saw in the conditions in which they saw and experienced it,” Goates said. “This is sacred ground, but it becomes sacred for very personal reasons to those youth that feel the Spirit here and feel a deeper relationship with their Savior.”

Blake Hansen, a youth participant, said, “You can feel the Spirit when you’re walking along these trails.”

Fellow trekker Lydia Burrows said: “I have a pioneer ancestor [who] came across in the Willie Handcart Company, and it’s been really cool to walk in his footsteps and to see and be in the places that he was. It makes me feel so much more connected and to realize that they went through really hard things. But through Jesus Christ, they made it.”

Added Brayden Calvin: “Trek has helped me draw closer to Christ by wanting to help others. I’ve been able to help with other people. So, like serving others, and then also just being able to turn to Him when things get hard.”

How to make a trek reservation

Members are welcomed and encouraged to have the trek experience at the Wyoming Mormon Trail Sites, said Benjamin Pykles, director of the Church History Department’s Historic Sites Division.

“You are walking where they walked and having as authentic an experience as you can get,” he said. “Trekking is still happening, and you have great experiences. We have this new route. It’s arduous, but it’s exciting.”

Handcart trek reservations for 2026 open in September. Information for how to request a trek reservation, along with itinerary options, planning resources, frequently asked questions and more, are available at ChurchofJesusChrist.org.