I grew up in Boston, and unlike everyone who says they are from Boston, I actually lived in the heart of the city. Traffic was my white-noise, people everywhere and very little wildlife. My father grew up in a time quite unlike today, born in 1931 and serving in the army post WWII. He always liked the outdoors and did manage to get the family outside now and then, but for the most part, we were urban-folk.

I managed to make some friends in high-school and college who liked camping and hiking. From drives cross-country and camping in the redwoods to taking a left-over keg car-camping with my good buddy Dave I started to consider myself an outdoor enthusiast. I even got lucky enough to take a wilderness survival course in upstate New York where we learned the bow-drill, debris hut and other primitive techniques.

I got a glimpse of my tourism during that class, but it wasn’t until I went hunting for the first time that I quickly realized how much of a tourist I was. Similar to my first time eating sushi in Japan-town and realizing all the wasted money I had spent on mediocre sushi in the wrong neighborhood of my city, my first hunting trip told me I had really not been paying attention.

Yes, it was true, I was a tourist in the wilderness. I didn’t know what plants were what, what tracks meant anything, what areas were to be avoided and I certainly couldn’t communicate with the locals. Maybe you don’t think it’s important to be a local in the woods, but I challenge that there is nothing you can do to keep yourself out of the wild, it is everywhere, and therefore not getting to know it is wearing blinders.

I’m sick of being a tourist in my own environment. I want to get to know my neighbors, know where to find the best food and have the insider knowledge so coveted by foreigners. Don’t you want to feel at home in your home? I want to feel as comfortable, confident and safe in the El Dorado national forest as I do in downtown Boston and San Francisco. I want to be a local.