Frémont named the river Mohahve after the Mohave people on April 23, 1844, although these people lived two mountain ranges away on the Colorado River. He had met six travelling Mohaves that day. Some early Mormon ranchers called it the Macaby River. Additionally another cutoff to the Old Spanish Trail had developed before 1844, where the trail forked northeastward from the Mojave River and Mohave Trail, east of what is now Yermo, California running over Alvord Mountain, to Bitter Spring, then through Red Pass, to join the Armijo route near Salt Spring in the Silurian Valley. The fork of the trails there on the Mojave River, later became known as Fork of the Road.