Son Volt’s “Highway 61″ from their latest album “Okemah and the Melody of Riot”

Link

In the picture my father is standing atop a peak somewhere in the wilds of Montana, and in the background a vast panorama of wilderness stretches out as if man never existed: rocky crags, sheer cliffs, cirques with ice-choked lakes, meadows of tundra and brilliant snow fields. A lonely paradise that Rudyard Kipling would have labeled, as he did another wild place half a world away, “…the back of the beyond.”

Link

At issue is the planned Pebble Mine, a combined gold, copper and molybdenum excavation touted as the largest open-pit mine on the continent. The location, just north of Lake Iliamna, sets off alarm bells for a significant portion of a drainage that nourishes North America’s most prolific salmon populations, along with Alaska’s largest rainbow trout.

Link

The people’s right to know about their government’s plans for national forest lands is getting the ax.

The Forest Service issued a final rule on Tuesday that will categorically exclude (CE) forest management plans from the requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) if they are updated or fundamentally altered.

Link

COLUMBUS - Five months after the Derby Mountain fire destroyed two dozen homes and burned thousands of acres, residents who were in the flames’ path sat down with fire managers here Tuesday to air their concerns and offer suggestions.

Will congress and the administration “sunset” our more primitive drive-in national forest campgrounds? When will our cherished public lands be properly funded? This fairly remote campground in the Gallatin National Forest could be on the chopping block.
Should the only campgrounds allowed to operate be ones that cater to RV’s, such as Bakers Hole near Yellowstone(which is also privately managed)?