The Enduring Wilderness

A look at how America has preserved more than 100 million acres of diverse wilderness areas in 44 states, now protected in our National Wilderness Preservation System. Discussion of current visions valuing wilderness and its place in our culture.

Featuring tributes from award-winning writers In a city sometimes referred to as “The Big Smoke,” Toronto’s extensive network of sunken rivers, forested vales, and expansive shoreline has been too often overlooked, neglected, or forgotten. However, the last 25 years has seen these distinctive landscapes rediscovered and even embraced as great civic spaces. Commissioned by the City of Toronto to chronicle the wonders of these wilderness parks, renowned photographer Robert Burley looks at these sites as integral parts of urban life, from breathtaking lake views of the Scarborough Bluffs to glimpses of the densely wooded trails in the Carolinian forests of Rouge Park, Canada’s first and only urban national park. p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 16.0px Times; -webkit-text-stroke: #000000} span.s1 {font-kerning: none} Burley’s photos are augmented with selections of poetry and prose by some of Toronto’s best-known writers, including Anne Michaels, George Elliott Clarke, Alissa York, and Michael Mitchell. A historical essay and an appendix highlight the history, the biodiversity, and the priceless cultural value of these urban parklands. Though confined to the city limits, An Enduring Wilderness is full of surprising ecological and urban discoveries that know no limits themselves.

Accidental Wilderness showcases how the removal of city rubble and its displacement can result in new urban parklands with significant ecological importance for the health of the city and its residents.

• The author is a distinguished member of the Explorers Club • The author is an unexpected adventurer, disarmingly positive and companionable • Lively stories of remote treks around the world Way Out There is an account of J. Robert Harris’s extraordinary exploits while backpacking in some of the world’s most tantalizing places―largely alone and unsupported. And after almost fifty years of wilderness travel, “J. R.,” as he’s known, has plenty of tales to tell! His stories are by turns funny, tragic, and uplifting, and are all told in his down‐to‐earth, friendly style. For J. R., it all began in 1966 when, as a young New Yorker, he impulsively drives his VW Beetle across the country to the very end of the northernmost road in Alaska, searching for an answer to a simple question: What is it like to be way out there? How this happened, whom he met, and what he encountered along the way became the foundation for a lifelong attraction to trekking and adventure travel. Subsequent chapters chronologically explore some of his many journeys, revealing an enduring wanderlust honed by his emerging maturity and outdoor skills. Stories of J. R.’s solo treks point to stark contrasts between his urban upbringing and his wilderness wanderings, while tales of adventure with small but diverse groups of friends are enriched by their collective experiences and varying viewpoints about exploration. Way Out There is a lively yet introspective book by a restless soul that will attract countless readers who love to travel, as well as armchair adventurers and communities looking for outdoor role models. The foreword is by the late Dr. Roscoe C. Brown, Jr., one of the famed Tuskegee Airmen fighter pilots during World War I

In The Wilderness: Saved & Suicidal, Tari authentically displays her battle with mental illness in adulthood. She captures the painful healing process from wounds of her childhood and a relationship that broke her to build her, all of which lead her to multiple suicide attempts. In her journey, she discusses the revelation that her experiences parallel when Jesus was tempted by Satan in the wilderness three times. Through finding comfort in God's promises and salvation in Christ, Tari uses her rawest moments with Him to show the honest, recovery process of discovering and plucking underlying roots that contributed to her cycle of emotional pain.While shining light on biblical truth and acknowledging stumbles in her healing journey, Tari provides wisdom, prayers, and insight for many to relate. The Wilderness: Saved & Suicidal, seeks to reveal the supernatural works of God, severe chains of shame and guilt, and to remind us that there is no testimony too big, too small, or too familiar that isn't worth sharing for the glory of Jesus Christ.Trigger warning: Please be advised that this book contains graphic content. If you are, were, or know someone that has battled with mental illness, please use your discretion and wisdom upon reading.

In The Edge of Extinction, Jules Pretty explores life and change in a dozen environments and cultures across the world, taking us on a series of remarkable journeys through deserts, coasts, mountains, steppes, snowscapes, marshes, and farms to show that there are many different ways to live in cooperation with nature. From these accounts of people living close to the land and close to the edge emerge a larger story about sustainability and the future of the planet. Pretty addresses not only current threats to natural and cultural diversity but also the unsustainability of modern lifestyles typical of industrialized countries. In a very real sense, Pretty discovers, what we manage to preserve now may well save us later.Jules Pretty's travels take him among the Maori people along the coasts of the Pacific, into the mountains of China, and across petroglyph-rich deserts of Australia. He treks with nomads over the continent-wide steppes of Tuva in southern Siberia, walks and boats in the wildlife-rich inland swamps of southern Africa, and experiences the Arctic with ice fishermen in Finland. He explores the coasts and inland marshes of eastern England and Northern Ireland and accompanies Innu people across the taiga’s snowy forests and the lakes of the Labrador interior. Pretty concludes his global journey immersed in the discrete cultures and landscapes embedded within the American landscape: the small farms of the Amish, the swamps of the Cajuns in the deep South, and the deserts of California.The diverse people Pretty meets in The Edge of Extinction display deep pride in their relationships with the land and are only willing to join with the modern world on their own terms. By the examples they set, they offer valuable lessons for anyone seeking to find harmony in a world cracking under the pressures of apparently insatiable consumption patterns of the affluent.