"Everyone is Entitled to Enter National Forests Without Paying a Cent."

So says one of the three judges who just shot down the illegal US Forest Service fee program on the Santa Catalina Mountains on the Coronado National Forest near Tucson, Arizona. The case is the result of four Tucson residents filing suit against the Coronado National Forest for requiring an entrance fee on the Catalina Highway, which imposes a fee for backcountry access that is clearly illegal under the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act (FLREA).

The three judges soundly rejected the Forest Service argument that since the amenities required by FLREA are present within the Mount Lemmon area, everyone entering the area has to pay for them, even though they don't plan to use the amenities and intend only to park, travel through the forest, visit scenic overlooks, camp in undeveloped areas, or hike into the backcountry. The judge further wrote, "The statute is abundantly clear that a standard amenity recreation fee cannot, under any circumstances, be charged for those activities."


Have a look at the Appeals Court decision- it contains such gems as "The Forest Service fails to distinguish—as the statute does—between someone who glides into a paved parking space and sits at a picnic table enjoying a feast of caviar and champagne, and someone who parks on the side of the highway, sits on a pile of gravel, and eats an old baloney sandwich while the cars whizz by."


http://www.westernslopenofee.org/pdfuploads/2012_02_09_Mt_Lemmon_Decision_Reversed_and_Remanded.pdf

For more information on the fight to restore free access to the public lands which YOU own, see http://www.westernslopenofee.org

Forest Service Recommends Eliminating Many Fees

The US Forest Service has sent memos to its regional offices recommending that fee areas be greatly reduced or eliminated in order to comply with the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act (FLREA): http://www.kvsun.com/articles/2012/01/24/news/doc4f1f237de8cae097339429.txt. It's up to the individual National Forests whether they comply with the recommendations.

FLREA is the law that replaced the original Fee Demo program. For background information, see http://westernslopenofee.org/.

Kindle Battery Life with Wireless On

Just a quick update to say that I finished testing the Kindle Touch 3G with wireless on continuously. The Touch had a strong Wi-Fi connection the entire time, and I used the reading light once for about an hour. To my surprise, the Touch lasted at total of 10.57 hours before the low battery warning came on the screen, which is almost exactly what Amazon claims.

Keep in mind that the Touch will use more power in areas of weak W-Fi or 3G coverage, partly because the data rate slows down and the wireless transceiver stays on longer to transfer books and other items. If you don't have access to a charger at least every few days, it's best to leave wireless off, turning it on for a few minutes at a time to sync and check for new items.

Kindle Battery Life

I just completed testing my Kindle Touch 3G with wireless off. The test conditions were as follows:

• Wireless off except for 5-10 minute periods to sync and check for new items
• Wireless usually Wi-Fi but occasionally 3G
• Reading periods of 5 minutes to an hour
• Some use of the reading light on the Amazon Lighted Cover for Kindle Touch

Unfortunately, I blew it toward the end of the test when the battery was down to about 40% by leaving wireless on overnight by mistake. In the morning the charge was down to about 10%. By that time I had logged 23.25 hours of reading. That matches up well with Amazon's claim of 30 hours battery life with wireless off based on 30 minutes per day for two months.

I'm partway through a test with wireless left on continuously with a strong Wi-Fi connection. So far I have 5.65 hours logged with about 30% left on the battery indicator. It looks like I'll fall a little short of Amazon's claim of 10.5 hours with wireless on, based on 30 minutes per day for three weeks.

The difficulty of testing battery life with wireless on is that battery drain varies with the strength of the wireless signal. Data transfer slows down with weaker connections so that transferring a book or blog takes more time and uses up more battery.

My conclusions so far are that the battery on the Kindle Touch 3G will last through most wilderness trips as long as wireless is off. Using the light on the Amazon Lighted Cover for Kindle Touch seems to add little to the battery drain, which makes sense because the cover uses a single LED.

Since most backpack trips are a week or less, wilderness hikers should be able to read as much as they like, unless they read for hours on layover or storm days. River runners on extended trips (such as the full three week trip through the Grand Canyon) are going to need a way to recharge the Kindle, which usually means a solar charger. I'm going to look at some solar chargers over on my new blog, Travels With Kindle. I'll also look at travel accessories such as covers and sleeves.

E-Readers on the Trail

If you're an avid reader like me, having reading material on a backpack trip, especially a solo trip, is an essential. You know you're in trouble after you zip through that paperback book you brought on the first two nights of the trip and then find your self reading food packages and tea labels over and over.

My traditional solution was to bring a book that fell short of being a page turner so I wouldn;t be tempted to stay up until the wee hours reading. Like the time a couple of friends and I were camped on the first day of a week in the Sn Juan Mountains of southwest Colorado. The weather was fine so we just laid out our bags on our unpitched tents and slept under the stars. Well, one of us sleep. At midnight Larry was snoring away but I was still reading by headlamp. A pool of light next to Larry gave away the fact that his wife, Sherry, was still reading too. I switched off then and sacked out but in the morning the horrible truth emerged- Sherry had finished her book. On the first night.

When PDA's came out I did some reading on my Palm Pilot but the screen was tiny, the type coarse, the battery life limited, the book selection very limited, and the eyestrain immense. Later PDA's improved, but not enough. To fair, they weren't designed as book readers.

So I followed the release of the original Amazon Kindle with interested, but it soon became apparent that the first generation had problems that needed to be addressed. Of course Amazon did that and any Kindle from the Kindle 2 onward makes a great wilderness e-reader.

Of the current crop, the lightest and cheapest is the Kindle basic with special offers. At 6.0 ounces or 170 grams it is lighter than a paperback and holds approximately 1,500 books. Even Sherry couldn't read that many books on a hiking trip. Amazon claims a month of battery life based on half an hour a day with wireless turned off. For a week hiking trip, that works out to 2 hours of reading per day.

For more battery life with just lightly more weight, the Kindle Touch starts at $99, weighs 7.5 ounces or 213 grams, and has double the battery life. For me the Touch is pretty much the ideal e-book reader.

Avoid the Kindle Fire or any other tablet computer for backcountry reading. They are too heavy, the battery life is only 8-10 hours, and the screen is unreadable in bright light.

Note that to get long battery life wireless must be off- in the backcountry you're not going to have a WiFi signal anyway. If you have a 3G Kindle Touch, and you're in an area with 3G service, turn wireless on only when you need it.

My use of the various Kindles pretty much verifies that battery life is close to what Amazon claims, but I'm going to run a real-world test. Unfortunately I can't go on a long backpack trip right now because of a looming book deadline (yes, I have to write about hiking rather than doing it.) So instead I just started a test with my Kindle Touch. It's a month old, so the battery should be close to its original capacity. Starting from a full charge today, I'll read with the wireless turned off and keep a log of my reading until the battery runs down.

When that happens I'll report back and also review some Kindle accessories that are useful in the wilderness.

Audit the Fees

Public land user fees as authorized by the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act automatically expires in December 2014. You can help push user fees to a timely demise by joining representatives from Colorado and New Mexico who are calling for an audit of the fee system.

Previous audits by the General Accounting Office have shown serious problems with accounting and overhead and collection costs. No surprise when the agency collecting the tax is also the one doing the accounting and spending!

All you need to do is write a letter, call, or send a fax to Representative Rob Bishop, the chair of the House subcommittee that oversees the US Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management, asking him to request an audit of FLREA.

Recreation Fees in Arizona's Red Rock Country: Not So Much

As a result of a judge's ruling in 2010, the Red Rock Ranger District on the Coconino National Forest, which administers the recreation areas around Sedona and Oak Creek Canyon, has greatly reduced the number of sites where a Red Rock Pass is required. Basically, you don't need a Red Rock Pass to park at trail heads without developed amenities or along dirt roads in the red rock country. Although the forest is still selling Red Rock Passes as if they are needed for the entire area, they are not enforcing the passes in certain areas. Instead the Forest Service is issuing a "Notice of Required Fee". Although it looks like a citation, this "Notice" is not a ticket and requires no action on your part.

Final rules which restrict the requirement for Red Rock Passes to the trail heads around Sedona, Oak Creek Canyon, and Arizona 170 between Sedona and I-17 are expected early in 2012. Even more important than the reduction in fees for the red rock area, this case sets an important precedent than can be used in future court cases challenging the fee program in areas such as the Pacific Northwest where passes are still being illegally required as parking passes where there are non of the amenities required by law.

For more information on the recreation fee program, see http://www.westernslopenofee.org/.