“If we take literally Nephi’s statement that they traveled ‘nearly eastward’ to Bountiful, the trade route is ruled out, for it soon veers in a pronounced southeast direction. … Nephi’s repeated emphasis (1 Nephi 17:1, 2, 6) on the hardships and difficulties of the journey are unmistakable hints confirming that a course almost due east from the Jawf [valley] was maintained. This direction took them somewhat north of the trade route, traveling first across the band of wasteland that lies between the shifting sand dunes of the southern edge of the vast ‘Empty Quarter’ and the smaller Saba’tayn desert, then onto an extended area of plateau. Here they would have been moving in areas far from known routes” (Aston and Aston, In the Footsteps of Lehi, 31–32).