Snowed in, and unable to get their wagons over the Sierra Nevadas, the Donner Party set up camp by Truckee Lake and waited for the winter of 1846 to pass. Food stores running low, a handful of able-bodied settlers make one last ditch effort to fetch help. As they wait for rescue, the members of the Donner Party are faced with a horrible decision: When we run out of food, do we cook and eat our dead?