KaiserJeep wrote: I happen to think that the NPS does a good job balancing access for all with protection.
35 years ago I was pretty hard core into wilderness trips and expeditions. We didn't even go into national parks which we regarded as parks. We were pretty intense about this, getting a back country permit in a national park meant we were being monitored and controlled of where we had to camp each night etc. We choose not to visit most national parks for this reason.
In the desert southwest we did a lot of back packing trips for 7-10 days into slot canyons on BLM land. Some of those magic spots have become upgraded to national parks or monuments in the meantime. Escalante Canyons and Great Staircase are now monuments, back then in the 70's this was all still BLM land were a few of us knew the access points to some wilderness canyon areas that were completely unknown by the general public. We considered these spots secrets and very few knew about these spots. It was word of mouth and hand drawn maps back then, nothing published. This added to the allure of these places.
I worked back then for several years as a therapeutic wilderness counselor working with problem kids and all our spare time me and my buddies were off on crazy expeditions, back packs, one time 600 km canoeing the Churchhill River in northern Saskatchewan for the whole month of September.
We were hard core. Looking back now as a 60 year old I admit we were kind of arrogant and cocky but at the same time wilderness flowed through our veins and nothing less than unregulated huge wilderness areas off the map would excite us. As I said National Parks were just parks for us.
I am still the same in many ways, I still hold myself somewhat exclusive over most of my fellow humans. This all started back then. Like KJ I have physical limitations but our 400 acres that borders 1.5 million acres still provides me that sense of wilderness, walking our trails that touch directly a vast upland wilderness where tapirs and jaguars still roam.
I am grateful to wilderness for exposing me to a deeper sensibility to the natural world and yes I admit that this perspective makes me consider most humans as having quite diminished lives. Call me elitist if you like, I am just being honest. I consider most of humanity to be shallow & superficial, cowardly, indolent, lazy, mostly trash actually. Takers not givers. Wanting the good life which means big cars and houses and all the works.
This is related to why I support the growing disparity of wealth. Most of humanity makes bad use of wealth. Given the chance they consume away as much as possible, even more than they should as you can see by the debt levels. That's not to say I support the 1%. They are mostly trash as well. I support the growing disparity of wealth in order to restrict wealth to the 99% not because I am aligned with the 1% which I am not. I just know that in aggregate we would be consuming a lot more if we more evenly distributed the wealth. Humans don't handle opulence well, better to restrict access.
I am an elitist.....yep. definitely.
Patiently awaiting the pathogens. Our resiliency resembles an invasive weed. We are the Kudzu Ape
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