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Interesting post, and a complicated issue. You can understand the local community interests being concerned about changes that may affect how they perceive and use the park, on the other hand, National Parks (or monuments in this case), are just that and guidelines are established to manage them at the National level. I think the Barbara Moritsch book, "The Soul of Yosemite", lays out the issues very well, agree or not, about the competing interests vying for access to these National treasures.

Yes Lee, and I hear EES is particularly prevelant among current and former government employees and the 47% that pay no taxes.

Meanwhile in other news, the Center for Disease Control announced today that is monitoring a new and potentially dangerous virus that seems to be sweeping America.

It's called Epidemic Entitlement Syndrome. The infection usually presents in a series of loud statements proclaiming that the infected person is entitled to do anything they wish to do, when they wish to do it, and wherever they wish to do it. That is often followed by convulsive repetition of condemnation for anyone who may try to point out other opinions and a total inability to consider other points of view. Some scientists are investigating reports that the virus appears to become exacerbated when fees or taxes of any kind are mentioned in the presence of one who has been infected.

Feilicity, here are a few photos of bullet and modern scratchings on ancient petroglyphs located in Dinosaur National Park. You can find bullet holes in almost all petroglyphs everywhere in the southwest.

Road signs take their share of hits, too.

Sadly, this seems to be a growing problem in other western parks as well, and some of those have been covered on the Traveler:

Here are links to stories on a current problem at Joshua Tree National Park, and an earlier one at Glen Canyon National Recreation Area.

Felicity, you can start a little closer to NYC. There are parks in the vicinity (Gateway NRA, Statue of Liberty, Morristown, Delaware Water Gap NRA, Steamtown) that struggle with graffiti. Contact the superintendents of the respective units and have them direct you. Post back here if you need help.

Felicity Barringer from the NY Times here. This looks like a story to me. HAs anyone on this site heard of other instances of wilderness graffiti, in National Parks or other remote and beautiful places (I think I heard about some graffiti near the petroglyphs in Utah's Nine Mile Canyon a few years ago). If there's more of this out there, I'd really like to know. Best e-mail is . Just put Park Graffiti in the subject line. Or follow up on this thread...Many thanks

FB

Very nice photographs! Thanks for sharing.

One tip I have found in using black & white film is that using a green filter instead of a red one helps bring out detail in scenes where there is a lot of red tones. I photograph the missions of Texas and there is a surprising amount of red tinge to the stones. Using a green filter brings out that detail. Because filters pass their own color wavelength more freely, red filters tend to hide the amount of detail in reddish stones. Unfortunately, I could not tell you if this works in a digital environment. I only shoot film.

It was sometimes hard to find a dry spot to sit in the arctic and I can recall only a very few days in a thousand miles of backpacking where it was warm and dry enough to stretch out comfortably on the tundra for a nap. It was usually raining, or cold, or the mosquitos were bad. As I often said you had to work hard to enjoy the arctic. Of couse I laid the 12 guage flat on the ground, and the barrel worked well as an ice ax on soft and moderate snow slopes. Otherwise it was a poor subtitute for bear spray and if park visitors are concerned about their safety it makes more sense than a gun. Besides bear spray doesn't kill anything and would allow a bluffing wild animal to walk away from an encounter. If it leaks in your car or house it will have to be evacuated for a while. Occasionally a pilot in Alaska would have to fly with his head out the window if a can leaked and they were usually fastened to a wing strut or elsewhere outside the cabin.

Would amputation be to harsh of a penalty?

Thanks for the nice words, Bob. That first shot was definitely a consolation prize for me not being able to make it completely up to the top of the arch opening. I was about midway when I turned around, plopped myself on some slickrock, set up the tripod in a precarious position, and captured that image.