Camping in Kisatchie National Forest
Into the woods with friends. And a dog.
I am going to tell you a story that has been told many times before. Inexperienced camper ventures out into the wilderness with her friends and a dog. The girl prepares for days, mostly counting on her experienced outdoorsman friend to make the supply lists.
On hers: homemade granola, two bottles of wine, enough Hershey’s bars for a dozen s’mores, baby wipes, a pillow, and Murray, her cocker spaniel.
On the guy’s list: two tents and a bivy sack, a camping stove, elk skin gloves, a Randall knife, a hatchet with accompanying leather holster, a mostly-full bottle of whiskey, and two guitars. “We will be practicing ‘leave no trace’ principles,” the outdoorsman friend tells me before departing a night before the group. “Consider that when you’re packing.” Then, as if to remind me of our intention to create as primitive a camping experience as possible, he says, “My blood type is O-negative. You know, just in case the bears get me.”
My husband, our musician friend, and I set out for Kisatchie National Forest the following morning. The entire forest is spread over seven Louisiana parishes and broken up into noncontiguous districts that total over 600,000 acres of land. We drive to the closest point of entry, Kisatchie Ranger District, which is just under three hours from Baton Rouge and a bit beyond Alexandria. Following the Longleaf Scenic Byway to the Kisatchie Hills Wilderness Area, we had already decided to forego campsites with grills and outhouses in lieu of something that felt more authentic. Kisatchie’s map reads like a choose-your-own-adventure story. With eight options for campsites, nine scenic overlook spots, fifty miles of trails for biking, hiking, and horseback riding, and a bayou with rapids for canoeing and fishing, all within just the Kisatchie Ranger District, the forest provides any number of options for whichever type of experience you’re looking to have.
Our adventure begins at Longleaf Vista, Louisiana’s second highest elevation point. On a clear day you can see for six miles from this spot. The Southern pines, sturdy yet forgiving to the wind, give the illusion that we are somewhere else entirely. For South Louisiana residents, our quick escapes outside typically include marsh and cypress trees—clear indicators of our coastal roots. But here, among the ridges and pines and sandstone slabs, we may as well have transported ourselves back to our Cajun ancestral home–Acadia in Maine and Nova Scotia, from which our forefathers were expelled during le grand dérangement.
“Kisatchie is such a treasure,” the National Forest’s public affairs specialist, Amy Robertson, says. “It’s hard to believe we’re even in Louisiana.” Kisatchie is the state’s only National Forest. And with its expansive territory and atypical terrain, it’s a wonder more of us don’t know that we have access to such ecological grandeur.
We hike just a mile into the 8,700 acre Wilderness Area, but that is plenty far to feel complete and intoxicating isolation. The Wilderness Area is unique to this district of Kisatchie, and pure in the most literal ways. No hunting or off-road vehicles. Just backpackers, some horses or perhaps a dog.
Murray, the blonde cocker spaniel, blends nicely into the brush, and the combination recalls rolling sand dunes, dipping and peaking as Murray bounds and blazes his own trail. Just a week earlier, the forest service conducted routine burns, which diminish the risk of wild fires by taming the forest’s “understory.” We pass trees marked with white bands that signal colonies of the endangered red-cockaded woodpecker. Once we join our outdoorsman friend on a bluff overlooking the Turpentine Hill the tents are barely pitched before one guitar is out, serenading an audience of dancing pines. The outdoorsman takes his hatchet and rope to collect kindling, while the musician alternates between flamenco riffs and folk songs, and my husband watches our dog “realize his most authentic self.” I focus on the wind as it plays auditory tricks. At once, it sounds like sheets of rain and a highway, but it is neither. The locals call this area “Little Grand Canyon,” for its vastness that makes you feel both miniscule and larger-than-life at the same time.
Kisatchie wasn’t given national forest status until 1930, though as early as the late 1800s, eighty-five percent of Louisiana was covered with virgin forest. The name was derived from the Kichai Indian tribe, who referred to themselves as “Kitsatchie,” and parceled throughout the expanse you’ll find prehistoric Caddo Indian sites. Developed recreation camps and pavilions aside, Kisatchie provides a respite from keeping time, giving the pines the responsibility of holding the forest’s history.
Night falls and we perform the ritual of camping—cooking, eating, playing music, and roasting marshmallows all while stoking a beautiful fire, giving thanks for the warmth, and remembering to spot Orion’s belt. There is something about retreating outdoors that pauses what author Joan Didion once referred to as the “dailiness of life.” There are no to-do lists to make because there are no errands to run, no work to confront or avoid. There is simply a combination of characters: the outdoorsman, the musician, the husband and the spaniel. And there is a plot of one’s choosing with a setting that varies from one Kisatchie district to the next.
When the kindling pile grows smaller stick by stick and the fire subsides, we listen to the wind and sleep until sunrise.
Details. Details. Details.