The Wild

Over the past year I’ve been thinking more and more on words we use to describe the outdoors and also those of us who venture into them. Terms such as outdoorsman, rarified, frontiersman, mountain man. Substitute woman at the end of all these terms as well! But the one that has solicited the most hours of thought and consideration is the phrase “the wild”. Does it exist still? If so where can it be found? Is the 100 acre state park outside of fenton, michigan true wild? Or do I need to go west and delve into the almost 2 million acres of “The Bob” to be in the depths of the wild? I think that the only true way to know the answer is to wander into the heart of the wood or sit and visit with the peaks and see what their views have to say on the matter. So this article talks about what ive learned about the wild and from the wild in the years that I’ve spent in pursuit of it and why at the end of the day a life long goal in my life will always be to seek the wild.
August 1st, 2007. The first time I heard a mountain lion roar. More precisely heard what sounded like the final scream of a woman about to be killed in a 1950’s horror film and to a recently turned 17 year old it was the scariest thing I’d ever heard. I heard this sound of death while sleeping in a tent, surrounded by 7 other tents, in a campsite that was surrounded by other campsites. All in all there was a grand total of close to 50 people within a hundred yard radius of me and yet in that instant I felt completely alone. I think back on moments such as this that have transpired through my life where I have felt extremely alone and I find that most of them involve being in the outdoors. Standing alone in the deep backwoods of northern Michigan and realizing there’s no one within 20 miles of you. Or watching the sun rise on a peak in south western Colorado and looking down and seeing people starting their climb over 2500 feet down and 3 miles away. To sharing a evening on a alpine lake in Montana with a momma grizzly bear and her cubs. These all bring to light something I feel is key to finding a wild place and that is: it has to scare you a little bit! As I stated earlier I’ve been trying to define “the wild” now for over a year and a couple definitions I’ve come up with are “any place where nature can get the better of you at any given moment” and “the residence of any creature or creation that refuses to be tamed”. These 2 statements have something in common and that is that they reference the unknowns you encounter when you venture into the outdoors and what better thing to get scared about then the unknown! You can prepare all you want for anything from a weekend outing to a through hike of the PCT but I guarantee that something will happen to you that will be unexpected and that no amount of planning can account for and ya know what, that’s ok. Now don’t confuse what im saying here this isnt a “well luke said to just go backpacking without planning and that everything would be ok” no no no! Planning and preparing should always be key parts to every trip. One of my biggest pet peeves as a guide is people getting deep into the backcountry and realizing that they haven’t prepared enough. What I’m referring to is the moments that happen AFTER you’ve done your planning and preparing and your on the trail and then all of a sudden you find yourself in a whiteout snow storm or you find that a rattlesnake doesn’t want to share the trail with you. Moments that cant be controlled and that force you out of your comfort zone and make you have to think on your feet. If you ever find yourself in this kind of a situation to you I say “ WELCOME TO THE WILD!”
Now there are most definitely other characteristics of “the wild” such as “a place where only a handful of humans have ever been” or “where you find a calming peace mixed with a little fear, a dash of adventure and a hint of inspiration” and the list could go on and on. In a lot of ways “the wild” can be very relative to every individual but the one thing that I feel remains is that it challenges you, forcefully encourages you to step out of your comfort zone and at the end of the experience odds are you’ve probably learned something as well. If you were paying attention.
So to all my readers out there, as I try and remind you often if you follow me on social media “seek the wild” for it can be a ruthless friend, a merciless companion and a ferocious teacher but in the end “the wild” will give more to you than any friend, companion or teacher ever could.