Bill Pugsley said he has been making and breaking plans his whole life.
So when he started making plans to re-enact the famous Donner Party's 900-mile hike across Wyoming, Utah, Nevada and California, his wife had three words for him: "Shoulda, woulda, coulda.""So I went down to the Reno Gazette (newspaper) and told them about the plans I was making," the 51-year-old former Reno motel manager said. "The next thing I knew there was a story in the paper saying I was going to do it - everything just snowballed from there."
Pugsley left Wyoming's Little Sandy River on July 17, exactly 150 years after the Donner Party left from the same location.
Two days later Pugsley was nearly hit by a drunken driver outside Fort Bridges, Wyo. He was OK but his golf pull-cart, which he was using to carry supplies, was smashed. "I was pretty down after that happened," Pugsley said. "Luckily a man named Daryl Nielson from Fort Bridges gave me his horse."
Pugsley has been using Patches, the 35-year-old horse, to help carry supplies the past three weeks. He believes the old horse will finish the trip but that it will be his "last major undertaking of his life."
Along with his 9-year-old harrier, Samantha, Pugsley walked into the Salt Lake Valley Friday, finishing 200 miles of the 900-mile trip.
He came into the valley with supplies and water in a backpack, which has a large sign on the back which reads: "Donner Party straggler 150 yr's late."
George Ivory, president of the Oregon-California Trails Association, has been helping Pugsley with his journey through Utah by arranging camp sites, assisting him through some of the heavy industrial areas of the Salt Lake Valley and letting police know his whereabouts.
"We've helped him avoid motels - we want to make this trip as realistic as possible," Ivory said.
Pugsley said making the trip on foot has helped him gain an appreciation for what the original group suffered through. "Every problem was the big problem for them. Every hill and every gully. This terrain can really make you ag-gra-vated," Pugsley said.
The father of three grown children labels himself a "history buff" who became interested in the history of Donner Lake and the people who settled there. Donner Lake is located near Truckee, Nev.
"I became interested in making the trip from all the reading I've done about the area and those people," he said. "Anyone who wants to come out and walk with me is more than welcome."