(bright music) - The first automobiles came to the northwest in tiny numbers around 1900.

They were expensive and fussy.

Only the rich and the technically minded could drive them.

(lighthearted music) If you ventured forth, you rode with a driver, a mechanic, and hoped for the best.

No service stations, no auto shops, no maps, no GPS, no AAA, no traffic laws, and no car friendly roads.

The region was, after all, still a true frontier in both the real and automotive sense, but adventurous motorists didn't let that stop them.

Today we take car camping and van life for granted.

But what about the pioneers who first drove the horseless carriage into the northwest wilds?

(lighthearted music) One of the first to test limits was the guy who set off the Klondike gold rush, George Carmack's.

(lighthearted music) He famously brought in gold from Bonanza Creek in the Yukon in 1896 and filed claims before other Stampedes got there.

In 1900, he moved to Seattle with his fortune and invested in mines, real estate, and recreation.

In 1902, Carmack's bought a state-of-the-art car, a mobile model 13 long distance steam touring wagon.

It set him back more than $70,000 in today's dollars.

It had room for his second wife Marguerite camping gear, and a bigger than standard boiler for its engine With a puff of vapor, the Carmack's headed south on wagon and stagecoach roads and trails, too small for even a two horse team With nothing paved, mud turned parts of the route into slick mush.

At 2000 pounds, the car and its load sometimes slid down the steep tracks of Siskiyou Pass without its wheels turning.

The Carmack's drove off road too, bushwhacking, removing large rocks, and cutting trees to clear the way.

The Carmack's traveled about 60 miles per day, and it took them a month to reach San Francisco.

They were the first folks to take that drive.

"If I had known what sort of trip it was going to be, I don't believe I would've started," George told the "San Francisco Chronicle" on arrival.

"I would not go back over that route," the sourdough declared, but he was emboldened.

"I would go anywhere with that automobile, now."

(lighthearted music) In the next few years, auto's proliferated and prices came down.

(lighthearted music) Despite the lack of roads and maps, the allure of the outdoors drew steam, gasoline, and electric autos and their increasingly middle class drivers into the woods.

By 1907, a smattering of horseless carriages were making their way to Mount Rainier National Park, but were turned away.

From Seattle, a trip to Rainier was a three day round trip at minimum.

Roads into the park were limited.

Komens were especially vociferous about wanting to get new and better roads in and around Rainier, which was the first national park to allow them in 1908.

By 1924 of some 160,000 park visitors, only 12,000 didn't come by car.

Cars and scenic beauty were now wedded.

Cascade Mountains posed a great challenge to early drivers.

At Mount Hood in Oregon, an annual contest was held to see who could drive the fastest and farthest up the mountain near Portland.

In 1908, ranchers along the route objected to cars, terrifying their livestock, but the racers continued.

In 1910, a Franklin Runabout made the trip in record three hours from the Rose City to government camp at nearly 4,000 feet.

Getting over Snoqualmie Pass was also a goal of early autoists, Planked, logging roads, and dirt trail through old growth forests were tried.

Cars drove up portions of the Snoqualmie River if wooden bridges washed out.

When they broke down, they had to be hauled out by old fashioned horsepower.

In 1910, 3 young men drove their Chalmers car from Seattle to Ellensburg.

"We're going through the pass if we have to build our own road through" one said.

They almost had to.

It took a grueling three and a half days, but they finally hauled themselves over.

In 1915, the Sunset Highway over Snoqualmie Pass was completed.

That year, another milestone was reached at Mount Rainier.

The Road to Paradise was finally opened to motorists a huge boost to tourism.

Joni Mitchell was right, paradise did become a parking lot.

(lighthearted music) As more folks drove to parks and scenic spots, local entrepreneurs introduced new devices to aid campers in making their autos a home away from home.

A Spokane company made an indispensable auto bed that was a wooden bed frame that fit in the latest cars for overnight comfort.

A Tacoma Lumber company manufactured the Gypsy Dyner, a wooden pantry that could be last to the running board and keep camp food fresh.

And some outfits, designed tents that could shelter both campers and their vehicles.

When you think about it, van life was nothing new here.

The covered wagons that brought settlers across the continent were essentially vans pulled by mules at oxen.

One Oregon Trail pioneer who came out was Ezra Meeker.

Famous for his Puyallup pop farm in 1913, adapting to modern technology.

He outfitted a 12 cylinder Pathfinder automobile with a canvas top, just like the old Conestoga wagons.

He called it his Schooner mobile.

And he and a driver retrace the Oregon Trail that Meeker had first crossed in 1852.

(lighthearted music) Meeker's trip was made possible by trailblazers like George and Marguerite Carmack's on their trip from Seattle to San Francisco.

They were pioneers of a new era connecting more people to our scenic splendor.

They didn't shout "Horseless carriages ho," when they set off, but they might as well have.

(bright music)