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68 °F Forecast | Road Cams Sunday, September 12, 2004 Today's News | Classifieds | Autos | Homes | Jobs | Tempo | Health | Community | Home Delivery SECTIONS Home Page Local News Sports Business Obituaries Life Opinion - Politics Tempo AP News Weather Classified Archives Site Map SPECIAL SECTIONS Since We Asked Outdoor Journal Prime Times Wellness Connection Readers' Choice Real Estate Showcase Joy Magazine Homelife Magazine Wedding Guide Rogue Valley's Finest EXTRA Newspaper in Education Personals Movie Times TV Times E The People MARKETPLACE Find a Car Find a Home Find a Job Classifieds Place an ad eSouthernOregon Automotive Communities Entertainment Publications Recreation Calendar CUSTOMER SERVICE Frequent Questions Advertising Information Home Delivery Employment Contact Us Media Kit Network Affiliate Oregon Road Conditions & Cams Email Story to a Friend August 15, 2004 Governor: Wilderness is where God resides By PAUL FATTIG Mail Tribune If you told Ted Kulongoski to take a hike, he’d consider it a compliment. But only if it led to a trip into the wilderness. Oregon’s governor is an avid backcountry hiker, driven by a passion to explore and experience the state’s wilderness areas. "After about a day out there I forget about everything else," he says. Advertisement Kulongoski, 63, has hiked into most of Oregon’s wildernesses, from the Kalmiopsis in the state’s southwest corner to the Eagle Cap in the northeast. He has walked in the shadow of Mount Jefferson and cast flies into the Sky Lakes in quest of an eastern brook trout. "You can get out there and not see a soul, even if you are out there eight to 10 days," he says. "When I come back, I can live off it (spiritual renewal) for a month." In terms of sustenance, what he lives off of during his wilderness treks is not something often served in the governor’s mansion: freeze-dried meals, powdered orange juice and food tubes filled with peanut butter and honey. "It’s a great weight-loss program," he quips. However, the state’s chief executive supplements what he packs in with what he catches in lakes and streams. "I love to fly-fish — I fish a great deal," he says. To describe his feelings when on a wilderness trail, he refers to a question about his religious views he once received on the campaign trail. "It’s a very spiritual feeling — I find it more there than any place," he says. As an example, he recalls hiking into a remote lake created by a glacier in the Eagle Cap Wilderness to make a base camp, then climbing up to the 8,000-foot peak above the lake that evening. "I took my sleeping bag and stayed up there," he says. "You have a tremendous view with no artificial lighting. You are looking up at the universe. "It’s very impressive to see nature the way God intended nature to be," he adds. "... If God exists in any place, he lives in nature and resides in a wilderness area." Observing that much of America is now obsessed with "reality" themes on television, Kulongoski figures a wilderness area offers a slice of the real world. "It’s not just for those of us who like to see nature in its natural state, but for competing values of economic interest as well," he says, citing tourism along with livability for future residents. "But when you look at the percentage of forested areas in Oregon protected by wilderness, it’s only 3.6 percent." By comparison, Washington state’s wilderness area totals 10 percent while California has preserved about 14 percent, he says. "Oregon can do more." For instance, he supports expanding the Kalmiopsis Wilderness by 100,000 to 300,000 acres by adding adjacent parcels of roadless national forestland. Earlier this summer, the U.S. Forest Service proposed adding some 60,000 acres of roadless areas to the Kalmiopsis as part of a Biscuit fire salvage project. But any expansion, which must go through Congress, would have to be an agreement reached by the result of diverse interests working together, Kulongoski stresses. Before he was elected governor in 2002, Kulongoski and his wife, Mary Oberst, never took a cell phone into a wilderness. "My wife wouldn’t allow me," he says. That changed with his election. Now they are required to take a satellite phone, he laments. "But if the satellite phone doesn’t ring I never make a call," he says. Come winter, he has been known to walk into a wilderness on snowshoes, preferring that to the more traveled cross-country ski trails. Don’t ask him to pick a favorite wilderness. "Each forest is unique in itself," he says. A difference in climate, vegetation and geology makes each a singular place, he explains. He talks about the unique beauty of the Sky Lakes Wilderness, particularly in autumn. But he also appreciates the rocky regions of the Kalmiopsis. Kulongoski first visited the Kalmiopsis two decades ago during a float trip down the lower Illinois River. Later, as the state attorney general in the early 1990s, a legal case involving the navigability of the Chetco River surfaced, requiring him to once again visit the Kalmiopsis. Some may look out across the vast Kalmiopsis with its rugged serpentine rock and see nothing but a hard land of rattlesnakes, bear and cougar, where water is too scarce come summer and too plentiful come winter, he acknowledges. "But there is beauty in that as well," he says. "The beauty is the natural setting — that’s what you’re trying to preserve." Reach reporter Paul Fattig at 776-4496 or e-mail him at [email protected] Mail Tribune Home Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life Opinion - Politics | AP News | Archives | Site Map E Southern Oregon | Classified Copyright © 1997-2004 Mail Tribune. All rights reserved. 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