In September 1849, twenty-three-year-old Sarah Davis, carrying her three-week-old daughter, left behind her parents, friends, and hometown to follow the rivers and trails to California. Traveling with her husband and other family members, she crossed rivers and mountain ranges, ate snow in July, witnessed a man whipped almost to death, saw her sister-in-law die from cholera, crossed the Great Salt Desert in today's western Utah, and saw death and destruction along the Forty-Mile Desert in today's Nevada. She began her ascent of the Sierra Nevada in a snowstorm; crossed the Sierra Nevada near Donner Pass; and arrived in Nevada City, California, in mid-October 1850. Through it all, Sarah remained cheerful and optimistic. This is her story.