“To wander is to be alive.” ― Roman Payne March was a month of wandering. Flagstaff, Phoenix, the Grand Canyon, the Needles District of Canyonlands, Goblin Valley, Capitol Reef, Antelope Island, Lava Hot Springs…. with Fred and cats Chico and Luna, we wandered over parts of the Southwest, hiking, visiting friends and learning to enjoy …
If You Know Wilderness
"Without enough wilderness America will change. Democracy, with its myriad personalities and increasing sophistication, must be fibred and vitalized by regular contact with outdoor growths — animals, trees, sun warmth and free skies — or it will dwindle and pale." — Walt Whitman When I first read about the Public Lands Initiative Act I thought …
Living Nature, Not Dull Art
To me, spring means the following: Palm Sunday, Easter, and fat, frisky robbins; irises, crocus, forsythia and daffodils; mud, intermittent sun, and end-of winter snowstorms. For NPS seasonals, spring is also "hiring season"--that fateful time of year when re-hires are hailed back to parks they've known and loved, and new hires must choose among competing offers, …
Super Bloom and Spirit Food
"There were no lies here. All fancies fled away. That's what happened in all deserts. It was just you, and what you believed." Terry Pratchett It has been 11 years since the last super bloom in Death Valley. 11 years since conditions have been just right—soaking winter rains, warmth at …
The Great Forgetting
I arrived in Bozeman, Montana the third week in May more than ten years ago. The lawns of the university campus were mowed into a tidy green cross-hatch and I remember flicking off my sandals and having lunch under a blossoming crabapple tree. The sun-warmed grass was soft under my feet. It was my first …
Writing the Wild 