Walker returned to Fort Nonsense with his group of free trappers. Bonneville found them as interesting as the Delaware and one convinced him that a much better camp for the winter lay 200 miles west on the Salmon River.
Surprisingly Bonneville quickly agreed which got Captain Walker wondering why Bonneville built the fort - maybe for entirely different reasons than fur trapping over the winter. Nevertheless they stored extra supplies at Fort Bonneville, then packed up and moved to the Salmon River.
The Salmon River offered little improvement in shelter, game or trapping for the winter. Walker thought it a miserable establishment - not even sheep could be found for food. Walker had no intentions of spending the winter of 1832-33 at this camp. Walker began to think that this might just be a way for the fur companies to get rid of Bonneville - to an isolated place where he would be too busy trying to survive to do much fur trapping.
By this time Old Joe realized that it was impossible to educate Bonneville and to continue on with him would not only cost him his reputation with other mountain men, but may affect his own survival as well.
So two days after arriving, Walker took 20 men and left, heading northwest to the Madison River to trap beaver.
Next time..Not so fast buster...
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