Adventure in Tranquil Places

It used to be called "roughing it" or "getting back to nature." Contemporary seekers speak of "environmental awareness" or "the whole-earth experience." By whatever name, the grail of the great outdoors lures more and more thousands of Americans each year to an increasingly jampacked yonder where too often the awareness is of crowded humanity and the call of the wild has become the bawl of a transistor radio.

Station wagons and six-wheel camping behemoths descended last week like panzer divisions on state and national parks and forests; private campsites, with such names as Jellystone Park and Winnebago Springs, had a higher population density than a Manhattan city block. "Roughing it in the wilderness," as a Delaware state recreation official put it, "is when the air conditioning breaks down." In Wisconsin last July 4th weekend, 16,000 state-operated campsites were 99.7% occupied. Asked if he knew of an unspoiled area for a backpacking trip, a veteran outdoorsman in Michigan replied, "You're asking that question 100 years too late."

Yet more Americans than ever were braving blisters, bites and backaches to hear the babble of clear streams and have night skies as a ceiling--to savor, in Thoreau's phrase, "life near the bone where it is sweetest." And despite all the rush and crowding, those with stamina and imagination were still not too late to find adventure in tranquil places.

No Facilities. Of all the wilderness areas in the U.S., few are as unpeopled or uncelebrated as the north Maine woods, a braw land of pristine lakes, cathedral-quiet woodlands and rushing trout streams that sprawls over 2.5 million acres and contains the famed Allagash and St. John white-water canoeing streams. Inside the ten check-in points, where out-of-state visitors pay a $2-per-night fee, there are no rangers, gas stations, restaurants or stores. Scattered through the woods are some 500 campsites, none with "facilities." The lumber companies that own most of the woods have built dirt roads for their logging trucks, but few camping vehicles penetrate the fastnesses.

The Boundary Waters canoe area in northern Minnesota, along the Canadian border, is an unspoiled wilderness of lakes, rivers and streams where nothing can be heard but the swish of canoe paddles and the plaintive call of the loon. The Black Mesa, off the old Santa Fe Trail in northernmost Oklahoma, is totally undeveloped, with "self-sufficient" camping only; from its highest point 4,978 ft. above sea level, there is a view of Colorado, New Mexico and Texas.

Among other overlooked camping areas within easy reach of a city is Montana's Fishtrap fishing-access site in the Big Hole River Valley, about 40 miles southwest of Butte. Not far from its campsites, moose, elk, deer, antelope, mountain sheep and goats graze. Fishtrap is a "blue-ribbon" fishing area--the state's highest designation--whose streams teem with rainbow, brown and cutthroat trout. Relatively few visitors have discovered the Bighorn River south of Billings, Mont., which encompasses mountains, upland prairie, desert and wetlands and the Pryor Mountains, with prehistoric caves to explore. In Wyoming's Grand Teton National Park, the broad Snake River, bounded by stands of aspen and lodgepole pine, affords both white-water rapids boating and lazy, meandering raft rides. Backpackers can trek into some of the ruggedest terrain in the Rockies.

A well-guarded Eldorado for backpackers is a onetime gold-panning area, California's Plumas-Eureka State Park. The 4,422-sq.-mi. park nestles in the northernmost Sierras at 4,000 ft. above sea level and 80 miles north of Lake Tahoe. Glacier-carved granite peaks rise above the timberline marked by noble stands of ponderosa, Jeffrey and sugar pine; Eureka and Madora lakes sparkle in the summer sun, which even in August has not melted the mountain snows. Jamison Creek, running fast and clear through the park, is alive with half-pound rainbow and brook trout. Campers looking for more strenuous recreation backpack into lake-dotted Plumas National Forest, which offers good deer hunting; black bears, cougars, mountain lions and bobcats can also be seen there.

Risk Trippers. In Michigan, last year nearly 20 million vacationers visited the 78 state parks, and three enormous national forests were saturated with summer visitors. But solitude could be found on any of several state-owned islands on Lake Superior and Lake Michigan. Only the hardiest souls venture on the island expeditions organized by Paul Risk, a prominent outdoorsman whose wilderness-survival courses at Michigan State University draw capacity enrollment. Risk trippers are allowed to take only a blanket, sleeping gear, two candy and two meat bars. One survivor recalls that last year an eleven-member expedition to Garden Island for two weeks subsisted on 36 fish, 29 rabbits and three ducks, plus wild herbs, wintergreen and Euell Gibbons staples.

Because it is accessible only by boat or plane, Isle Royal National Park in Lake Superior is still uncrowded. The 45-mile-long island is a glacier-compacted wilderness of immense topographical variety, pierced by 120 miles of trails. Says Backpacker Eddie Maier, an environmental engineer from Lansing, Mich.: "When you step on the island, it's like stepping back 200 years." Flora and fauna spotters can look for 101 varieties of wildflowers, 40 varieties of birds and five kinds of fish that are unique to the island; moose can be seen swimming in birch-fringed coves. For those who like to commune with room service as well as nature, the island has a modern hotel at each end.

Guaranteed Eagles. For other vacationers who crave the exhilaration of the outdoors with some catered comforts as well, there is British Columbia's Nicola River Valley. Little known even to Canadians is the Quilchena Cattle Co.'s rococo 18-room hotel and 25,000-acre working ranch, about 250 miles northeast of Vancouver. Guy Rose, owner of the ranch and grandson of its founder, never advertises his off-offbeat hotel, "so we don't get a bunch of people here we wouldn't like." The lakefront hotel was built in 1908, has a bullet-riddled bar, brass bedsteads in the huge rooms and a splendid view of the valley from all windows. It serves guests the same hearty meals the chef cooks for the ranch hands; dinner is only $3.50. There are plentiful campsites near the lake; campers can fish, hike or trail-ride Rose's horses over the ranch and treat themselves to dinner at his hotel.

Another semitough way to see the back country is to bicycle through it. Vermont Bicycle Touring in Bristol has devised 74 different rural bike trips lasting from a weekend to 16 days and suited to riders of all degrees of proficiency; nights are spent in small country inns. Wisconsin has two of the nation's finest rural bike trails: the Elroy-Sparta (30 miles long) and the Sugar River (23 miles), which are laid out on paved-over railbeds and are barred to cars and motorcycles; the grade never exceeds 3%.

An outdoor vacation that requires no legwork at all is Wagon Ho!, a threeday, 5-m.p.h. slog through Kansas over an old wagon trail--in authentic replicas of covered wagons. For about $800, a family of four rides a prairie schooner driven by a hired hand, with stops along the trail to investigate the Smoky Hill River or the surrounding hills. The weekly wagon trains pull out from Quinter, 325 miles west of Kansas City, travel 110 miles round trip and, claims Wagon Ho!, never come within sight of a road or house.

More and more serious campers fanned out through Canada's well-named Wood Buffalo National Park, which sprawls over 17,300 square miles and is reputedly the world's biggest national park. Located on the 60th parallel between Alberta and the Northwest Territories, the park is laced with hundreds of lakes, forests, and meadows where whooping cranes summer and the last large herds of bison roam. There are only 16 developed campsites, though bivouacking is allowed if the visitor has a campfire permit.

Also in Canada, but considerably easier to reach, is the fine West Coast Hiking Trail on the southwest coast of Vancouver Island, a cannon shot from Washington State across the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Still being developed as part of Canada's newly dedicated Pacific Rim National Park, the 22 miles now open are equipped with suspension bridges over ravines, cable cars across two river canyons and a boardwalk along the rougher sections. At one point, the only way to cross the Nitnat Narrows is by dugout canoe, handled by Nitnat Indians who charge $2 for the ride and sell fresh crabs and smoked salmon on the side. Ideal for a four-day camping trip, the trail winds through forest and beside the ocean, where gray whales can be seen. John Watts, Pacific Rim's acting superintendent, told a visitor last week, "It's exciting and enjoyable, and I will personally guarantee a sighting of bald eagles."

Even in Alaska, where publicly owned park, monument and forest areas total more square miles than there are in Connecticut, Maryland and Delaware combined, oldtimers are beginning to feel crowded. However, there are more than a dozen aviation companies throughout the state that specialize in flying vacationers into remote areas for canoe, kayak, raft, backpacking, hiking or sheep-hunting trips. One such expedition was arranged by an Anchorage man and three friends from the Lower 48. After being dropped north of the Arctic Circle, they drifted on rubber rafts down the Noatak River to Kotzebue Sound in two weeks. "It was the most relaxing trip I've ever made," said the organizer, Andy Williams, who claims to have read War and Peace and quit smoking en route.

Dog Tours. A less arduous expedition offered by Wien Air Alaska flies vacationers to Katmai and its Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes, an awesome volcanic area where U.S. astronauts trained for moon landings. A three-day outing for $250 combines a stay at Katmai's resort hotel with hikes into a wilderness hundreds of miles from other human habitation. And there are organized dogsled trips: Anchorage's Denali's Dog Tours offers four days from Mount McKinley Park headquarters into Toklat Lake for $200.

Eventually, gasoline prices may rise so high that vacationers will simply not be able to afford long drives to overpopulated parks. They may seek out, instead, wild areas closer to home that have 'been bypassed by the Winnebago set. Such spots can be discovered almost anywhere and are worth the effort. Finding one, as 22-year-old Mike McCorkle of Montgomery, Ala., said on first sighting the Grand Canyon, is "sorta like sex. They's some things better and some things worse, but they ain't nothin' exactly like it."

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