Читать книгу Running with Wolves - National Kids Geographic - Страница 15

“I found it!”

That was my message in a nutshell.

In a letter to Jamie, I described how I had found the perfect place to build wolf camp. It was in the Sawtooth Mountains, across the valley from where cougar camp had been.

I had explored other mountain ranges in central Idaho, but I could never find a place that had everything the wolves would need. Then I discovered Meadow Creek. It’s an area of meadows, forests, creeks, marshes, and ponds, all near the base of the Sawtooth Mountains.

This place was really off the beaten path. I took a dirt road across two ranches, and when the road ended, I got out and walked. The landscape changed dramatically as I hiked up a slight incline. It’s amazing the difference a little change in elevation makes! Instead of the dry sage of the ranches, I suddenly found myself in a green, grassy meadow.

It was like a piece of paradise. A mountain brook trickled past me on my left while bright yellow aspen leaves twisted and turned in the breeze on my right. In front of me stood a deep green forest of towering lodgepole pine, Douglas fir, and spruce. And above that rose the majestic Sawtooths. Their summits formed a jagged gray ridge against the deep blue sky.

Meadow Creek had everything I could want. It was remote enough that people wouldn’t wander by and disturb the wolves. In fact, people would have a hard time finding this place even if they were looking for it. Yet the site could be reached by an equipment truck, which would be needed to haul in materials to build the enclosure.