You attend a public meeting held for "folks with the California - Oregon fever." You're told:
If you leave too early, there won't be any grass for your oxen to eat. If you leave too late, you may not get to Oregon before winter comes. If you leave at just the right time, there will be green grass and the weather will still be cool.
You decide that a DOS game's advice is too cryptic. The computer lab conveniently has an encylopedia set sitting over in a corner, so you instead consult a copy of
Encyclopedia Wikiped, O-P.
The encyclopedia informs you that people usually took between 4-7 months to travel along the trail. Several famous expeditions left in May, which would get you there in September at the earliest. In March the average temperature is around 45 degrees F, and it's likely that the grass still hasn't had time to recover after winter.
