An excess ascent and descent of 7.1x indicates that, except for the climb up the Portneuf Range, the topography is not especially challenging. Hudspeth Cutoff Figure 2 reveals that Fort Hall is located on the Snake River near a major, right-angle bend in the trail. In this stretch the cutoff traverses the Great Basin divide three times, consequently elevations approach or even exceed 6,000 feet. In the same direction, but somewhat closer, they could distinguish the Salt Lake Cutoff heading toward its junction with the California Trail. This leg finally crosses Raft River and meets the Fort Hall segment at Cassia Creek.
Water is almost non-existent for more than twenty miles along the central part of the cutoff.
Topographic disadvantages are abundantly obvious with excess ascent and descent of 14.9x or more than twice that of the Fort Hall route. Furthermore, average elevation on the Hudspeth is more than 500 feet higher. About the only topographic disadvantage of the fort route is that its solitary high point is on the Portneuf Range, slightly higher than any of the more than half-dozen ridges on the cutoff. Intuitively, the cutoff seems to promise a considerable savings of possibly forty to fifty miles. And yet it is only about ten miles shorter due to the whole series of course changes required to reach offset low passes on the numerous northsouth-trending mountain ranges.