September 5, 2002

MADISON CAMPGROUND, YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK

Today was a day off for the Trek and Support teams aside from a morning talk by the Park Service, a tour of Old Faithful, and three evening presentations. During the day someone needed to stay in camp to watch the tents and all of our equipment. As I had not gone through all of my gear for several weeks and done some much needed reorganizing (and had visited Yellowstone previously) I volunteered to stay. It was nice to have an entire day to relax and get my stuff cleaned up at a leisurely pace.

We’re five weeks into the American Frontiers Journey. One of the primary goals of the Journey is to demonstrate to the American public the availability of public lands. Thinking back on what we’ve experienced and looking around this campground I can really appreciate the accessibility of our public lands. (From our initial training I can share that nearly one-third of the nations lands are public, public lands are within all states and within 100 miles of every major metropolitan area.) It’s good to see the range of people enjoying our public lands in the ways that they are most comfortable with. During the Journey we’ve experienced strenuous and unusual ways to travel our lands. Here in the park it’s primarily couples and small groups, many of them seniors, touring by car, motorhome and fifth-wheel trailers. Across from our camp this morning I visited with a brother and sister, Dave and Kathy Charters from British Columbia, touring and tent camping on matching Gold Wing motorcycles. They’d already covered 2000 miles and to Kathy, “It’s an adventure of a lifetime!”

Whether a Sunday afternoon picnicking at a county park, a Saturday fishing from a jetty, backpacking in a Wilderness, trail riding through a National Forest by dirt bike or all-terrain vehicle, horse riding in a state park, visiting National Parks by motorhome, or just taking a stroll on a city walking path what’s important is that people are getting out and enjoying the land.

Without exposure to public lands can people appreciate their cultural, natural, recreational, and economic value of them? And if they do not will they be interested or willing to protect these lands in the future? Present and past administrations, legislators and publics talk about protecting land and resources, pass legislation and make special land designations, land management agencies have been cut back in staff and funding. I am rambling here and jumping about with thoughts but I feel a certain amount of anger when I see trails and facilities that desperately need work (and we’ve seen many instances over the past thirty-six days.) and the managers not having the money to get the work done. This is particularly frustrating when land management plans propose closures or restrictions in order to protect resources in place of management.

Surprise, surprise, Dave Mensing has just come into the RV where we are madly composing our Journal entries and told us that we will get carry new technology global positioning system (GPS) grizzly bear tracking collars for the United States Geological Survey (USGS) in order to help test them when we are backpacking in the Gros Ventre Wilderness. This should be interesting! From the Journey, dana