A warm, late-summer breeze wafting across Memaloose Lake greeted Tom Wiese, his son and grandson as they completed the short, uphill hike through old-growth forest drenched in every conceivable shade of green.
Although the three found no signs of the chanterelle mushrooms they'd ventured out from their homes in nearby Estacada to hunt, they seemed more than consoled by the rugged, sweeping beauty that defines one of the nation's newest formally designated wilderness areas.
"This is what paradise looks like," said Wiese, 51, a retired warehouseman, gazing across the lake's wind-rippled surface. "About as natural as it can get."
A bill signed into law in March by President Barack Obama capped a 12-year effort to increase wilderness areas around Mount Hood and along the Columbia River Gorge.
The 127,000-acre expansion -- nearly half of it in Clackamas County -- provides permanent protection for trees as old as 1,000 years, countless wildlife species and rivers and streams that provide daily drinking water for more than 165,000 residents in the Portland metro area.
For many, increased protections in the Clackamas River watershed alone make the entire effort worthwhile.
"Water is going to be the oil of the future," said Sandy Mayor Linda Malone, whose city was among the many municipalities and business groups that supported the legislation. "All too often, when people think about wilderness, they don't think that the starting point for drinking water in Portland is up in that wilderness."
Lynn Peterson, Clackamas County chairwoman, agreed. She recalled testifying in favor of the bill more than five years ago, while serving on Lake Oswego's City Council.
"Our main message was that we didn't want it to be cool to drink bottled water," she said. "We wanted it to be cool to drink Clackamas River water."
The Oregon expansions are part of the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009. It designated 52 new wilderness areas and added acreage to 26 existing areas for a total addition to the National Wilderness Preservation System of more than 2 million acres.
Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Oregon, first introduced the Mount Hood-related aspects of the legislation in 2003. Scores of meetings and public hearings followed as interest groups of all stripes weighed in. Some wanted far more land protected, Wyden said, while others pushed for much less.
The key to eventual success, he said, lay in making the argument that wilderness areas, especially those close to large population centers, are good for business.
"We started naming companies such as Columbia Sportswear and Yakima," Wyden said. He noted that Oregonians spend millions annually on outdoor gear and clothing. "In the end, we demolished the myths that protecting land on Mount Hood is bad for the economy."
Ancient wilderness
Five miles southeast of Estacada on Oregon 213, roadside signs signify the Mount Hood National Forest boundary. A right turn onto Forest Service Road 45, followed by a 10-mile drive along a narrow but paved road, takes visitors to the Memaloose Lake trailhead.
Before the area's wilderness designation, logging could have occurred at any time. Now, the stands of hemlock, cedar and fir towering over an understory of Oregon grape, ferns and prickly Devil's Club can't be disturbed by anything more powerful than human feet and horse's hooves.
"This would meet anyone's definition of an old-growth forest," said Erik Fernandez, wilderness coordinator for Oregon Wild, the Portland-based environmental group that helped launch the effort to increase Mount Hood's wilderness protections. "Not only are some of the trees ancient, but the variety of wildlife and plant species here is just breathtaking."
Hawks, ospreys, eagles and turkey vultures join a cadre of smaller songbirds in the air. Cougars, bears, elk and deer rule the ground.
Fernandez first began scribing lines on maps in 1997, while still an Oregon Wild volunteer. He and other group members "ground-trooped" all of the proposed wilderness additions to get firsthand views of the physical features and aesthetic values involved.
"We started with drafts, refined those and then responded to each of the five or six different proposals Congress came up with," he said. "We didn't get everything we wanted, but that's what next time is all about."
A smooth path
The most remarkable aspect of the Mount Hood additions may have been the lack of organized opposition. Aside from scattered grousing among mountain bikers, snowmobilers and a handful of timber interests, the push to add wilderness areas in Oregon was remarkably smooth.
It wasn't always this easy.
In the late 1970s, the mere mention of designating more of Oregon's national forest lands as wilderness triggered screaming matches between environmentalists and timber interests.
By the time Congress expanded the Mount Hood Wilderness Area in 1984, advocates on both sides of the issue were battered and bruised. Feelings of mutual hostility lingered for years, setting the tone for the contentious forest wars that followed.
This time around, by contrast, the most spirited opposition came from a seemingly unlikely source, Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Oklahoma. He invoked Senate rules to slap a hold on the proposed legislation. He applied the move to dozens of other proposals, saying he feared their passage would cost too much money.
In the end, woefully outnumbered, he dropped plans to filibuster the wilderness bill, and it passed almost immediately.
With an estimated 4 million people visiting Mount Hood annually, the bill's passage couldn't have come too soon, Wyden said.
"This is a huge victory," he said. "It's really a textbook story of how Oregonians came together to achieve something that is essentially everything Oregon."
Three generations of the Wiese family said as much during their recent climb to Memaloose Lake. As Jason Wiese watched his 4-year-old son, Tanner, toss small rocks a few feet into the crystalline waters, Tom Wiese explained that the place feels like home.
"It's just an extension of our backyard," he said. "Being able to use and enjoy this land is really what it's here for."
