The much-prized outhouse at the Thorofare Cabin/Robert Pahre

My son and I are sitting on the porch of Yellowstone National Park’s Thorofare Ranger Station, about 32 trail miles from our car. We got here a little sooner than we expected this morning, so we’ll have a second breakfast of dried fruit and nuts while we take turns using the outhouse.

No backpacker likes digging catholes, so the outhouse is clearly a destination. You can read the reviews in a journal in a rack on the wall, near the door.  In that journal, backpackers express their thanks for the many wonders of the Thorofare Region - including its outhouse.  One visitor wrote in the journal last year, “Thanks for 5☆ privy.”

That’s a pretty generous rating, truth be told. It’s missing a few floorboards right where you need them to be. The outhouse is also a major attraction for flies and mosquitoes in the Thorofare’s buggy lands. But still, it exists. Would visit again, four stars.

Until they hit the trail, backpackers don’t dream of reaching this outhouse. They do dream of the Thorofare Ranger Cabin, though.  It’s clearly the central destination in the region, a way to say that you have been to the Thorofare. 

Visitors to the Thorofare often leave their comments behind for others to enjoy/Robert Pahre

The cabin is also a nice place to stop and read what other visitors have written in the journal. As my son and I leafed through the journal, we connected with those hikers and horsepackers who were here before us.

Many just say they’re glad to make it. “After years of thinking about it, we finally made it. This truly is one of the most incredible spaces.”  One large group wrote that “We are so excited & happy to be here. It is a dream come true to have been able to hike to this very spot.” Others call it a “Once in a lifetime opportunity” or a “Trip of a lifetime.”

The Thorofare enjoys a reputation among backpackers, so the journal has many variations of “Check it off the bucket list. ✓” For another, it was “Mission Accomplished!”  A third wrote, “This cabin has been on my bucket list for eight years. It did not disappoint!”

Others write about the history behind their dream. “Cross one off the bucket list! After a failed attempt two years ago and after learning a lot from that experience, we finally made it!” One woman saw this is a culmination of her experiences in Yellowstone, “I have been camping, hiking & backpacking here for 20 years. My boys went from being toddlers to men, with lives of their own. I saw a wild wolf for the first time, a sight I never thought I would see. Standing here, at this cabin has been my husband’s and my lifelist for years . . . it’s a thrill to sit on the porch and write this . . . don’t think I will make it here again.” 

Like us, one father-and-son pair had been looking forward to reaching this destination for a while: “My son and I are finally able to do this. Big trip off of the life list.”  I sympathized with a group of men aged 53 to 61, in my generation. One of them added an extra note to his triumph — “I’m doing 68+ miles in my 60th year!”

Quite a few visitors are park employees who have been looking across Yellowstone Lake with yearning for some time. One pair knew they wanted to do this once they started working in the park: “We’ve both been wanting to get down here since each started working in the park . . . 5 and 8 years ago. It lives up to all the praises we’ve heard!” Other park workers wrote that, “Between the two of us, we’ve worked 25 seasons in Yellowstone, and this is our first trip to the Thorofare. It’s every bit as wonderful as we’d hoped.” The people who waited the longest to reach this spot are probably the pair who wrote, “Worked in the park in the mid 70's and met and married my wife from the park. Have been wanting to do this trip >30 yrs.”

At this point, some of you are probably wondering what makes this location so special to so many backpackers.  Despite its charms, it’s not about the outhouse. Instead, it’s the distance. Near the ranger station lies the most remote spot in the Lower 48 states, defined as the place most distant from any road.  That spot is about 25 miles from any road as the raven flies, and that remoteness is why the ranger station is on the bucket lists.

That distance is clearly a big draw. “Most remote, yay!” wrote one hiker. “How great to be in the middle of ‘middle of nowhere.’” wrote another. One couple wrote that they “Can’t get over the vastness and remoteness of this valley. Truly Incredible.”  Another pair gave a thought to the journey back –“A few blisters, and we made it! (Half way).”

Before we return to the journal, let’s pause for a moment and think about what those 25 miles mean.  You probably remember that the area of a circle is equal to π times the square of the radius.  Being 25 miles from a road means that the most remote spot has a circle of non-road space all around it – a circle with a radius of 25 miles.  That’s about 1965 square miles of non-road land and water.  Of course, there aren’t a bunch of roads reaching up to exactly 25 miles from the spot, so there’s actually many thousands of square miles of wilderness connected to this place.  You can do a lot better in Alaska north of the Arctic Circle, but still, the Thorofare is part of a very large roadless wilderness.

The most remote location in the Lower 48?/Robert Pahre

It’s also worth noting that 25 miles from a road by air is not the same as 25 miles by trail.  Our route was pretty direct, and it was about 32 miles to get here.  The journal has many people telling how they got to the cabin, often by coming up from Pilgrim Creek in Grand Teton National Park, across Bridger-Teton National Forest. Others come across from Heart Lake along the south side of Yellowstone Lake, or from the Snake River along the South Boundary Trail. A few come through the Washakie Wilderness and over Eagle Pass. Quite a few use boats to reach the trail at the Southeast Arm, and then hike down from there: “Began trip @GrantsVillage on 19th Sun. Kayaked to South End, packed down Two Oceans Trail, across South Boundary Trail, camped @west end of Bridger Lake then today hiked to the Most Remote Spot in the Lower 48.”

Once they get here, many people want to write about the wild country around them. One couple called it “wilderness, vast and quiet.”  Another writes, “A great day!  What wilderness!” A third says, “Feels good to know there is so much wilderness left to explore.” Yet another “Can’t get over the vastness and remoteness of this valley. Truly Incredible.” One couple wrote, “It has been a joy to spent time in such pristine wilderness, which has afforded much space for awe and contemplation.”

For many, the journey has been a spiritual or religious one. One couple ends their journal entry with, “Peace to all, back to the sacred wild.”  Others make more explicit religious connections, writing that “This hike has been a dream for years and what a blessing it is to see and experience this beautiful part of God’s creation.” Another says, “It’s amazing how the Lord provides and what he has wanted for us to enjoy.” 

For some younger backpackers, this destination was part of a spiritual quest. A young man writes that, “On my 20th summer, I wandered on my own to find me land that God had made that man had left alone. I found a land of beauty I never would have known . . .” A young woman says that “I wanted to push myself to new limits and I wanted to work on my faith . . . . I found what I came here for and cannot wait to go home and tell everyone about my adventure.”  We met her at a stream crossing, where she told us that her adventure included a grizzly bluff-charging her across a creek. She had responded admirably, and the encounter ended peaceably.

On a secular level, many visitors also give thanks to the rangers of the National Park Service.

A group of four wrote, “This area speaks of wildness,” before adding a note to the ranger, “Thanks for all you do to keep it wild.” Another wrote the ranger, “Thank you for all you do to make sure all this wonder is cared for.”

Others reminded us that all Americans, and not just the rangers, need to preserve this wilderness.  One couple said, “Thank you to everyone who works to make sure this will be here for our grandkids & beyond.” Another asks her readers to “Preserve this trail for all future generations . .  . . Thanks to everyone who has helped preserve this land.”

One way the NPS preserves this place is by not identifying the exact spot that is farthest from any road, so as to prevent impact.  This works because there is some debate on the internet as to where the point lies. Setting that aside, some of us might quibble a bit with giving title to Yellowstone, since Isle Royale’s Point Houghton is even farther from a road.  Of course, maybe using Lake Superior as part of your “roadless” miles is cheating. Maybe not.

The Thorofare certainly feels more remote than Isle Royale.  We’ve only seen one party a day on the trail. Isle Royale buzzes with cabin cruisers and other boats, while the Thorofare buzzes only with mosquitoes.  Other than mosquitoes and flies, the wildlife is wary. I spooked a deer with a camera click from over 100 yards away.

Maybe that’s because of a different kind of click that shows up here in the fall. I added the Thorofare to my own bucket list after reading Gary Ferguson’s Hawk’s Rest. While Ferguson writes of the beauty of this land and its wildlife, he was here during hunting season. The Thorofare region straddles Yellowstone National Park and Bridger-Teton National Forest. It was a thoroughfare for Native peoples and for mountain men, and it’s also an important route for migrating elk.

Ferguson describes a lively horsepacking community on the national forest during elk season.  We saw only one hunting party in the Thorofare journal, though, who wrote that, “My brother and I are taking a morning stroll after filling our elk tags over near Hidden Creek.”

We went the other direction, from the cabin into the elk hunting grounds. After our second breakfast, we hiked toward the valley of Thorofare Creek, past a Wyoming Game and Fish patrol cabin. The valley was empty, but the social trails in the area testify to a lot of horse traffic. 

If we’d taken a different turn we would have forded the Yellowstone River to the Forest Service patrol cabin at Hawk’s Rest. You could string together visits to all three cabins in an easy day hike, as long as the river can be forded. Having three patrol cabins this close together adds evidence of the crowds of the hunting season. 

The journal at the Thorofare Ranger Station records autumn visits from the rangers at those other cabins. They invite one another over to dinner, or let the park ranger know when next they’ll be dropping by.  Some friends of rangers also write a quick note to say hi, or say when they’ll next be dropping by.  There’s a community of the trail out here.

We join that community of the trail when I come across a friend’s entry in the journal. We’d last seen each other at a conference in October. She and a friend had hiked the Thorofare just a month before, when the tourist season was dying down and the hunting season has not yet started. Like many backpackers who live in the Greater Yellowstone Area, they had hiked up from Grand Teton National Park, through the national forest, and into the park. I take a photo of her entry in the journal, and email it to her when I get back home.

A see a few more familiar names.  One coauthored a book with a friend.  Others are scientists who presented papers at conferences I’ve attended in Yellowstone, and one is the husband of a park administrator I’ve met at one of those conferences. Four days into our trip, we have met two scientific groups on the trail, researchers and graduate students who used the cabin as a base camp for their studies. We will meet a park trail crew on the hike out, with a ranger who checked our permit. That sounds busy, but we see few others during our trip. 

In fact, we saw only one tourist party a day, in prime August backpacking weather. It’s a sparse community, far from the busy Sturgis Rally we drove by to get here, but the Thorofare Cabin has a community of wilderness lovers all its own. 

Robert Pahre is a Professor of Political Science at the University of Illinois, where he teaches and writes about environmental policy and the politics of national parks.

Those who hike to the Thorofare via Yellowstone Lake might be treated to a glowing sunset, such as this one from the Brimstone Bay Campsite/Robert Pahre