Opportunities for Solitude

[MarkVK]

The thread about camping concerns started to veer into an area that I think is worth a thread of its own. So, here goes...

Early in my career I did a lot of applied social science research for the US National Park Service (USNPS). Some of the most interesting work revolved around the concept of solitude.

To any USNPS managers who are responsible for areas legally designated as Wilderness (capital W means legally designated), solitude is a fundamental concern. The US Wilderness Act states that Wilderness areas must be managed so as to provide, "opportunities for solitude".

As with most laws, that is easy to write down on paper, and hard to translate into policies. Immediate questions that arise include:

Is solitude an experiential (i.e., psychological/idiosyncratic) construct or an objective, physical measure of separation between individuals (or parties/groups)?

What constitutes an "opportunity"? How many opportunities are required in order to have a "wilderness experience"? Are some types of opportunities (e.g., camping out of sight and sound of other parties) more important than others (e.g., seeing others while moving through the environment)?

Is it OK for Wilderness areas to offer different levels of solitude? Is it OK for higher levels of solitude to require more time/effort/fitness/money/red tape for visitors to access?

How much should managers consider/regulate the ways that solitude is affected by encountering visitors of different types? Visitors using different forms of transport (e.g., pack stock vs hikers) or guided vs unguided?

I know this is a big topic, so I'll just say that I think it's inevitable that solitude will be more available in areas that are more remote and difficult to access. And that I am more saddened by uses that alter the physical characteristics of those remote areas (e.g., logging, mining, fish farming) than by recreational use that may affect me more directly in the form of campsite competition or less time spent with other people out of sight and sound.

 

[CPS]

It's a big topic for sure.

I had a few chances to muse on the ideas of Solitude and Wilderness over the summer. As was brought up in more or less real time, more and more of the coast is connected by cell service than ever before. I was able to periodically update folks on this very forum as my trip went on.
Being able to chat with folks about the history of the cabins at Burnett Bay while walking down the beach was a somewhat surreal experience.

Here I am on a rugged and beautiful beach, witnessing the full force of a gale slam into the shore. I paddled there solo, yet could send folks video clips of the waves coming ashore. If I wanted 'true' solitude I could just turn off the phone.
But I got to thinking about what 'true' solitude means, what being in the capital W wilderness means. Maybe I'm just a cynic, but my overall realization is that both are fictions.
I have a cell phone, which more often than not has signal. I have an InReach to share updates with folks. My PFD had a PLB tethered to it. My entire 'solo' trip is actually done at arm's length from civilization. My fingertips still touch civilization as they tap away at a screen, or compose a message on my InReach. One generation newer and my cellphone would be able to send messages directly via satellite, officially closing the entire coast to the notion of being 'out of reach'.

Ultimately if one wants to create the illusion of solitude, one turns the devices off. If another group of paddlers arrives at a remote beach one could begrudge their intrusion into your illusion of solitude. Perhaps saying hello and exchanging stories with them is a better option. After all, maybe you have ruined the illusion of solitude they were trying to enshroud themselves in. By joining together socially you become, at least for a time, a single group of kayakers each briefly weaving each other into a net of experiences. When you consider the population of earth is currently over 8,000,000,000 then maybe sharing a beach with a handful of other people is just a statistically insignificant blip. But that illusion of solitude has a real appeal to the romantic, slightly masochistic paddler.

I would stake my life on the fact that every beach I have ever landed on gas had a human on it before me. Likely countless other people have visited over innumerable generations. Sometimes the signs are obvious, like a sculpture in the woods, or a float tied to a tree. The same illusion of solitude yearns for real capital W Wilderness, to explore at the margins of the world, discovering places untouched by others. It's a big, steaming, pile of horseshit illusion.
How many flat places did I set up camp where the trees showed long healed wounds from when someone had carved out a place for themself? Not zero.
How many of those places were used, in some capacity, before the arrival of Europeans to the coast?
Not zero.
Those people who travelled the coast before the idea of 'leave no trace' did pave the way for future users who could in turn leave no further trace.
Sitting in the Washburne cabin, itself an affront to the ethos of LNT, and skimming through the incomplete collection of notes from visitors helped me realize that even when traveling alone along the coast, there are innumerable others who are paddling alongside, displaced from you only by time. Their experiences would be different, but would share a lot of same highs and lows. Beautiful sunsets, horrible wind, crashing surf, paddling on a mirror under a staggeringly blue sky.
Bumping into any of them and sharing a beach, even just for a moment, would probably be more worthwhile than a self-imposed solitude, as arbitrary and imaginary as that might be.



Does that mean I'm eager to pull into a site overflowing with others? Absolutely not. But most of the time it doesn't take much paddling at all to get away from others. I like being off the beaten path. I like the illusion of solitude. I like feeling like I'm on the edge of the world.
But if I'm honest, I would be way more disappointed to see a beautiful secluded beach covered in marine debris than to see that same beach covered in the colourful nylon domes synonymous with adventure.

 

[MarkVK]

It's a big topic for sure.

I had a few chances to muse on the ideas of Solitude and Wilderness over the summer. As was brought up in more or less real time, more and more of the coast is connected by cell service than ever before. I was able to periodically update folks on this very forum as my trip went on.
Being able to chat with folks about the history of the cabins at Burnett Bay while walking down the beach was a somewhat surreal experience.

Here I am on a rugged and beautiful beach, witnessing the full force of a gale slam into the shore. I paddled there solo, yet could send folks video clips of the waves coming ashore. If I wanted 'true' solitude I could just turn off the phone.
But I got to thinking about what 'true' solitude means, what being in the capital W wilderness means. Maybe I'm just a cynic, but my overall realization is that both are fictions.
I have a cell phone, which more often than not has signal. I have an InReach to share updates with folks. My PFD had a PLB tethered to it. My entire 'solo' trip is actually done at arm's length from civilization. My fingertips still touch civilization as they tap away at a screen, or compose a message on my InReach. One generation newer and my cellphone would be able to send messages directly via satellite, officially closing the entire coast to the notion of being 'out of reach'.

Ultimately if one wants to create the illusion of solitude, one turns the devices off. If another group of paddlers arrives at a remote beach one could begrudge their intrusion into your illusion of solitude. Perhaps saying hello and exchanging stories with them is a better option. After all, maybe you have ruined the illusion of solitude they were trying to enshroud themselves in. By joining together socially you become, at least for a time, a single group of kayakers each briefly weaving each other into a net of experiences. When you consider the population of earth is currently over 8,000,000,000 then maybe sharing a beach with a handful of other people is just a statistically insignificant blip. But that illusion of solitude has a real appeal to the romantic, slightly masochistic paddler.

I would stake my life on the fact that every beach I have ever landed on gas had a human on it before me. Likely countless other people have visited over innumerable generations. Sometimes the signs are obvious, like a sculpture in the woods, or a float tied to a tree. The same illusion of solitude yearns for real capital W Wilderness, to explore at the margins of the world, discovering places untouched by others. It's a big, steaming, pile of horseshit illusion.
How many flat places did I set up camp where the trees showed long healed wounds from when someone had carved out a place for themself? Not zero.
How many of those places were used, in some capacity, before the arrival of Europeans to the coast?
Not zero.
Those people who travelled the coast before the idea of 'leave no trace' did pave the way for future users who could in turn leave no further trace.
Sitting in the Washburne cabin, itself an affront to the ethos of LNT, and skimming through the incomplete collection of notes from visitors helped me realize that even when traveling alone along the coast, there are innumerable others who are paddling alongside, displaced from you only by time. Their experiences would be different, but would share a lot of same highs and lows. Beautiful sunsets, horrible wind, crashing surf, paddling on a mirror under a staggeringly blue sky.
Bumping into any of them and sharing a beach, even just for a moment, would probably be more worthwhile than a self-imposed solitude, as arbitrary and imaginary as that might be.



Does that mean I'm eager to pull into a site overflowing with others? Absolutely not. But most of the time it doesn't take much paddling at all to get away from others. I like being off the beaten path. I like the illusion of solitude. I like feeling like I'm on the edge of the world.
But if I'm honest, I would be way more disappointed to see a beautiful secluded beach covered in marine debris than to see that same beach covered in the colourful nylon domes synonymous with adventure.

I agree whole-heartedly that we are talking about an illusion. I would also argue that the Wilderness Act is rooted in an artificial image of the empty North American "wilderness" that was a direct result of the European diseases that largely depopulated the continent. I agree with all this, and at the same time I, too, like the feeling of seeing a natural landscape absent of humans and human artifacts.

 

[SWriverstone]

I think there are different aspects and definitions of solitude. To your point @MarkVK, Aldo Leopold viewed solitude (among other things) as a rare natural resource. He viewed places that other people could get to relatively easily as "vulnerable solitude." He called places guarded by enormous snowfall or floods as "secure solitude" (much harder for others to get there) that offer a deep sense of aloneness. And then he talked of "experiential solitude" which is a more temporal idea of solitude—of being in a natural place throughout the year (and over years) and getting to know it intimately—having a deep, personal connection to natural cycles.

Edward Abbey had a much more severe view of solitude—as a kind of "raw nature" that demands adaptation and thereby achieving clarity of thought and purpose. Abbey thought wild places should be a no man's land where we're forced to confront the indifference of nature. And of course self-reliance was huge to Abbey—he definitely thought that true solitude meant assuming risk and shedding the safety of modern technology.

I think my own definition of solitude is closer to Abbey's—it definitely means being intensely alone for periods of at least a few days at a time with not even the distant sight of other humans...although I wouldn't necessarily say that if you're with a few other people there is no solitude...just less of it. And to me solitude also means risk. I've never viewed having a Garmin InReach as destroying my solitude and eliminating risk; even with cellphones and satellite messengers, there are still countless ways to die or be severely wounded long before any rescue shows up (assuming you're even conscious enough to press the SOS button).

Despite my devices, I'm still determined to stay safe. I still view good judgement and staying safe not as optional, but 100% mandatory. If I ever need to call for help, I'd consider it a total failure of self-reliance.

The concept of solitude is definitely malleable though. For example, I've done overnight ski trips in the Cascades where, though I probably was never more than 10-20 miles as the crow flies from other people, the consequences could still be severe (including death) if I screwed up—because I'd be in 10-15 feet of snow, up at 6,000 feet, in a forest of tall firs—meaning if anything went wrong and I managed to call for help, it could easily be many hours before help showed up. In that time I could easily freeze to death.

I've been scared once or twice in scenarios where I was still a couple miles from a shelter at midnight...struggling slowly through snow deeper than I was tall...and worrying I'd just have to stop and bivouac in the snow. In those circumstances, it sure felt like solitude to me!

 

[SWriverstone]

I don't disagree solitude might be an illusion...but that strikes me as an awfully high bar. Are the astronauts on the space station living in solitude? If an object struck the station at 17,000mph, destroying it, we couldn't just blast off immediately to save them—but they could be in constant communication with mission control. (The same could be said of the Apollo astronauts—were they in solitude 230,000 miles from Earth? How about on the dark side of the moon?)

I'm not arguing against the "illusion" concept...just saying if it's an illusion, then what does real solitude require? (Being on an asteroid in space thousands of light years from anyone and unable to communicate with anyone?)

 

[JohnAbercrombie]

Are the astronauts on the space station living in solitude?

Solitude: the state or situation of being alone

So, by definition astronauts or participants in a group paddling trip aren't experiencing solitude. On a paddling trip one can go for a walk down the beach to experience some variety of solitude; on the space station that's not generally an option!
Do you think Bruce McCandless would have described his space walk as giving him a feeling of solitude?

 

[JohnAbercrombie]

For me, solitude doesn't require risky isolation. So it has little to do with the ability to call for help and get help. (That's about a different topic for me: self reliance.)
I can feel (the illusion of??) solitude sometimes close to 'civilization'. It's more the (selfish??) feeling of 'having the place to myself'.
William Rehnquist famously said: "I may not be able to define pornography but I know it when I see it."
For me, I know when I don't have solitude: When I have a quiet campsite on a solo paddle and a group of 10-15 other kayak campers lands on the beach.

 

[SWriverstone]

@JohnAbercrombie I'd agree with your "having a campsite to yourself, then it's invaded by a large group" as NOT being solitude!

Re: Solitude: the state or situation of being alone

Like so many things, even that definition is somewhat vague, because...what does "alone" mean? LOL According to the dictionary, it has two meanings:

1. Having no one else present. (strictly a physical definition, though it doesn't establish a "maximum distance" no one else must be present)

2. On one's own. (could be physical, but as anyone who's ever felt alone in a school classroom with no friends knows, could be psychological too).

Sorry, I don't mean to get absurdly granular. Just pointing out the "gray areas" in the definition. And I think we'd all agree—nothing wrecks solitude (however we define it) like a large group of people descending noisily upon an otherwise beautiful place devoid of any other human presence.

 

[cougarmeat]

Here's a thought - what if Solitude had nothing to do with the physical environment? What if what we call thoughts create a concept of "self", which brings in the existence of "me" and hence, all else are "others". Then, regardless of distances, there is always a "me" and always a "them". Now, imagine if you will, a moment of just perception. No me, looking at it. Just "this". And because there is just "this", there are no others. And with no others, there is solitude. Just Say'n.

 

[CPS]

I don't disagree solitude might be an illusion...but that strikes me as an awfully high bar. Are the astronauts on the space station living in solitude? If an object struck the station at 17,000mph, destroying it, we couldn't just blast off immediately to save them—but they could be in constant communication with mission control. (The same could be said of the Apollo astronauts—were they in solitude 230,000 miles from Earth? How about on the dark side of the moon?)

Despite the astronauts on the ISS being 400 kilometers up, they can still talk to people. Can solitude and high-speed wireless communication exist simultaneously?

If I am on a plane with a few dozen people, but with no in flight wi-fi, I am more socially isolated than those same astronauts. Now the important distinction is that my flight is only a few hours long, not the months of an ISS mission.

If an inmate is locked into a cell without any access to outside world, even though there are hundreds of others nearby, they have a greater amount of isolation, if not precisely solitude, than anyone else.

So it's not necessary physical distance, but rather the availability of communication, that makes for solitude.

I think that's precisely why it is an illusion, at least in the context of a kayaking trip. When a kayaker, or a hiker, goes out for solitude it is a self-imposed isolation. The solitude is one that is maintained by not turning in a device, not checking emails, not messaging loved ones. It may have been the reality at one point that you could go on a kayaking trip and become incommunicado by that very act, but now it requires additional steps.

Here's a thought - what if Solitude had nothing to do with the physical environment?

Said more succinctly than I ever could.

 

[MarkVK]

Studies of human perception make it clear that our sense of the world is based on only some of the information available from physical reality and is always curated and interpreted even before our consciousness places a meaning on it. Accordingly, when I agreed that solitude is an illusion, I wasn't implying that it was meaningless, or could be summoned or dismissed at will regardless of the environment.

I'm not sure I've seen a statement yet in this thread that I actually disagree with. I think we are all just elaborating on the different facets of kayaking in remote environments that we value, and the ways that human presence affect those experiences. Which, in retrospect, is the main reason why I started this thread.

 

[AM]

To any USNPS managers who are responsible for areas legally designated as Wilderness (capital W means legally designated), solitude is a fundamental concern. The US Wilderness Act states that Wilderness areas must be managed so as to provide, "opportunities for solitude".
…
Is solitude an experiential (i.e., psychological/idiosyncratic) construct or an objective, physical measure of separation between individuals (or parties/groups)?

Interesting question. I would answer firmly - the former. Solitude is experiential.

Solitude is an ancient ascetic practice (along with celibacy, fasting, and more extreme examples — consult your religious/anthropology texts). It required going away from people — the village, the tribe, etc.

“Wilderness” as we understand it, however, is a product of 19th century romanticism, a reaction to industrialization. It has political undertones and, more importantly, historicizing undertones (as in “we need to protect a primordial innocence that has been lost due to ‘progress’”). The problem with wilderness-romanticism is that it gives us the expectation that we can return to this imagined past, go “back to the land”, live as “one with nature”. And of course, this ideal is neither possible nor desirable. We take our high tech gear, comms devices, and luxury food. We expect rescue when “wilderness” turns nasty. We treat “Wilderness” as just another product on offer, complete with a kind of warranty package.

We also start making complaints, like angry customers: why are these people on my beach/mountain? How dare they ruin my solitude? Don’t they know how much I paid to be here?

The two sides of your question reveal this divide.

Why I choose “experiential”: if we take solitude as an ascetic exercise of leaving the tribe for a time, then we can see how dead easy it is to find.

Cheers,
Andrew

 

[SalishSeaNior]

I fully concur with Cougar Meat's thought that solitude and environment are not mutually arising or necessary. Solitude is a human condition that can happen even in certain quiet conditons with others handy by.

“Our language has wisely sensed the two sides of being alone. It has created the word “loneliness” to express the pain of being alone. And it has created the word “solitude” to express the glory of being alone.”
Paul Tillich

to me, solitude is the state of being alone, often by choice, offering a valuable chance for rest, reflection, and self-discovery, distinct from negative loneliness or forced isolation. It involves physical seclusion or mental distance from others, allowing for inner focus, a calming of the incessant babbles of self and ego, and a break from social demands and from society, it can lead to benefits like increased self-esteem, gratitude, and clarity as is my own experience.

The US Wilderness Act states that Wilderness areas must be managed so as to provide, "opportunities for solitude".

I suspect that the quote from the Wilderness Act actually intuits the deeper meanings of what is meant by the word "solitude". For me, when i seek solitude, which is often, and often a craving, I find it best to seek it in the calm and timeless cycles of the natural world. Kayaking in wilderness spaces takes me to that place of real solitude.

If you take technology, friends, tasks, and timelines anywhere, then you are unlikely to experience solitude in my view. Solitude to me is letting go of the human world and immersion in the natural world. Cyclic time, not linear time; contemplative thoughts, or no thought, not conscious thought.

When thoughts arise, then do all things arise. When thoughts vanish, then do all things vanish. Huang Po

The ability to find solitude in wilderness has been hugely degraded and continues to degrade rapidly. This is due both to a quadrupling of the human population since I was born, and to the ingrained modern western worldview with regard to marketing, technology and the need for stuff. As well as our idea of human dominion over nature ( absolute garbage idea that ). It is evident in the trash on wild beaches and the constant demand for overused campsites, it is evident in the ideas that we have to rely on and take technology with us everywhere, we go. We post about these things here all the time. Thankfully, to me at least, we also have the knowledge, experience and bandwidth to think about, share and discuss these matters in a civilized discourse here.

I applaud the American Parks and National Forest systems, though they are now under serious threat from folk who have no use for solitude or wilderness. I applaud my own Government's steps toward reconciliation with our Indigenous peoples, though we are early on. It is my own hope, that we can next take on modern western consumer society and oligarchs and take the things that matter to people and the environment as things they will respect and help protect, voluntarily or with law.

Is it OK for Wilderness areas to offer different levels of solitude? Is it OK for higher levels of solitude to require more time/effort/fitness/money/red tape for visitors to access?

To that I say a most emphatic "YES".

Our culture has invented a concept of "human rights" and we in the west now place these "individiated rights" on a pedestal. Yet we now go around in circles arguing about whos rights matter most, or whose rights should be taken away, all with differing ideas, as is our "human nature".

Nature, is not human. Though we are a part of nature that now needs much control and cultural re-engineering. Nature does not need us, yet we are part of nature. So the next question for me, is what about the "rights of nature" including to be free, or at least protected from human mismanagement, left alone to do what nature does. Rights of nature is a concept that is taking root in international law around the world and in many countries. Not surprisingly, there is a strong bias against it in western culture, as that would mean my rights need perhaps be limited. There are in fact countries who have rights of nature clauses now written into their constitutions and where corporate and human interests are being curtailed to protect nature and hence access to solitude.. It is my fervent hope that we westerners are intelligent enough to get there too.

Therefore, the more pressing issue to me is the "need for protected nature". For without nature, there can be only be less true solitude in my view. Solitude, and natural biodiverstity, both necessary and interacting policy issues in my view.

Canada has committed to a national goal of conserving 30% of its land and oceans by 2030. This target is part of the global Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, signed by 195 countries to combat biodiversity loss and climate change. I hope that policy gets follwed and done and perhaps we can also look at rights of nature legislation and the curbing of rights of corportations and individuals that conflict with those rights.

That is my own thesis on the topic. None of these matters are simple, or subject to easy solutions, hence I value these discussions and discourse of people with a.passion and who care about these things.

Cheers, Rick

 

[SWriverstone]

Great discussion all! Thanks.

There is a very small (maybe growing?) movement of wilderness advocates who are pushing for the establishment of so-called "no rescue" zones in federally-designated Wilderness. These would be places where the government (and SAR teams) are not obligated (and exempt from prosecution related to that lack of obligation) to rescue anyone in distress. The point would be...

• A way to promote personal responsibility and preparedness in wilderness travel.
• A tool to reduce financial and operational burdens on search-and-rescue (SAR) teams.
• A means to maintain a more “pure” wilderness experience with minimal human intervention.

I doubt such a proposal will ever fly; too many people would scream bloody murder (pun intended) about such no-rescue zones. I'd support no-rescue zones! And go into those areas knowing full well I might never return if I'm not careful.

 

[SWriverstone]

I don't think there mere existence of communications devices means solitude doesn't exist. It only doesn't exist if you use those devices. If all I do on a multi-day trip is look at my iPhone for navigation purposes, I still feel a deep sense of solitude (as long as there are no other people around). 99% of the time, all I use my phone for is taking photos and checking maps. I typically put my phone in airplane mode and disable all notifications. (I never want to get text messages or notifications while I'm in wild places.) And my InReach typically stays turned off in an easily accessible pocket.

(For some reason this reminds me of the "if a tree falls in the woods and nobody hears it, is there any sound?" paradox...LOL)

 

[SalishSeaNior]

We expect rescue when “wilderness” turns nasty. We treat “Wilderness” as just another product on offer, complete with a kind of warranty package.

Andrew, you nailed it. The western world view. That is why when I choose to seek wilderness and solitude, I either do not take, or turn off my tech, even when it could be used. I also firmly have the view that I will try very hard never to put myself in s situation where rescue is the primary option. It is a last resort and only because my loved ones, "clan" and greater society would find it a requirement.

"Paddling out is optional, paddling back is not"

 

[SWriverstone]

As with so many of society's ills these days, I blame social media for the loss of solitude. (Really. And I don't consider this forum "social media," as forums like these predate "social media" and will outlast them too.)

Chasing "likes." Trying to one-up friends. Seeking out the most Instagram-worthy photos. Aiming for empty sensationalism. Creating clickbait. Being jealous of others' "perfect" lives, etc.

In one of the best articles ever published in The Atlantic, Jonathan Haidt makes a powerful case for Facebook's launch of the "Like" button in 2009 as being the beginning of the end. When all of a sudden everything on social media had to be validated (or not) with a "Like" everything changed for the worse. (Remember the time before FB was enshittified, when your feed had no ads and only featured your friends and people you followed?)

This is a bit off-topic...except I heard from many USFS and NPS and BLM staff that social media was directly responsible for many formerly pristine places being ruined...

 

[Ransomed]

These would be places where the government (and SAR teams) are not obligated (and exempt from prosecution related to that lack of obligation) to rescue anyone in distress.

I'm not trying to hijack the thread, but that statement is completely incorrect in the US. That might be the perception, but it is not the reality.

There is extensive case law at the federal level, primarily as a result of US Coast Guard rescue missions, that give those in charge of rescue operations wide latitude concerning whether to launch a rescue mission and how to conduct the mission. There is no federal law or regulation requiring rescuers to conduct high risk missions or to die trying to save someone.

Armchair quarterbacking involving federal rescue assets by a plaintiff's attorneys will get dismissed in the pretrial motions by a competent US District attorney.

 

[SWriverstone]

Thanks for that clarification @Ransomed. I guess my understanding is that while rescues are not required, it might be said that there is a moral/professional ethic that preventable death is unacceptable and abandonment would be morally indefensible (if legally defensible). I'm guessing that "no-rescue" zones might alter that moral calculus?