FIND Outdoors: Creating Experiences That Connect Us to Nature with Carolyn Ashworth

Welcome To Exploration Local

SPEAKER_00 0:00

You're listening to Exploration Local, a podcast designed to share stories about the people who shape the places we explore, the brands and ideas that get us out there, and the experiences that fuel a spirit of adventure. I'm Mike Andris, host of Exploration Local, and I believe there's always something new to discover and new stories to be told, whether it's around the corner or miles from home. I encourage you to wander far but explore local. Let's go. Find Outdoors grew out of the cradle of forestry here in Western North Carolina, the birthplace of forestry education in America. Today, their work goes well beyond the cradle, with Find Outdoors managing campgrounds, visitor centers, day use areas, and other recreation sites on public lands across North Carolina, Georgia, and Kentucky. In this episode, I sit down with Carolyn Ashworth, president and CEO of Find Outdoors. Carolyn has a really personal connection to the cradle. She spent a lot of time here as a kid, and in a lot of ways, coming back to lead Find Outdoors has brought her story full circle. We talk about that history, the changing role of partnerships and caring for our public lands, and why connecting people to these places may be one of the most important parts of stewardship. I really enjoyed this conversation with Carolyn. I hope you do too. Let's join the conversation.

What Find Outdoors Actually Does

SPEAKER_02 1:23

Find Outdoors is formerly the Cradle of Forestry in America Interpretive Association, which is the very first school of forestry in the entire country and gradually expanded to manage other public lands with other land managers in the Southeast. We manage lots of day use areas and campgrounds and museums and places of cultural and historic importance in the Southeast in partnership with the Forest Service and also the Army Corps of Engineers.

SPEAKER_00 1:51

This is a role and this is a place that you have really sort of had your eye on for a very long time. And uh, if somebody could ever say, I have the my dream job, I think you would be the one that would be the first in line to say that I'm definitely living my dream job life.

SPEAKER_02 2:06

When I was a little girl, my next door neighbor was my best friend. Her name was Janet, and her dad, his name was Mike, and he worked for the Forest Service. And his professional home was the cradle of forestry. So we were at the cradle of forestry quite a bit as a kid. And I felt really special, like I had backstage access. Yeah. And he was just so passionate and so excited about what he was doing all the time. Plus, he had a Yale key, so he had like the backdoor access to all the you know locked back roads. And even if 475B was closed, we could still get on it, you know.

SPEAKER_01 2:45

Lucky you.

SPEAKER_02 2:47

And so I always just thought he had the coolest job ever. And I wanted to be Mike Malash when I grew up. And in fact, um, when I went to undergrad at UNCA, I chose to study field biology because I really admired all of the people that I met at the Forest Service who could instantly tell you what a tree was or identify a bird or tell you what ephemeral wildflowers you could expect in early spring. I just felt like that seemed like a superpower. And so um, yeah, when this opportunity came up many years later, it really felt like returning home in many, many ways and just kind of like a full circle moment for me.

SPEAKER_00 3:31

Oh, I love that. Now you mentioned earlier about the CFAIA, and that was the Crittle Forestry in America Interpretive Association. It's a mouthful. It really is. Find outdoors is a lot easier to say, but that was really many people who know this area know that the the forestry and the forest management and the schooling goes way back, way back in the um Carl Schink days in the school that was built uh through through Biltmore. But I think it was in the was it late 60s and early 70s, is when the cradle of forestry sort of came online. It was built for interpretive purposes for people to experience, or yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:10

Um it was 1968 when the cradle of forestry was kind of codified by Congress as a place to be developed for people to come and learn about the story of forestry in America and how that developed. And so Yeah, and you know, that building and the physical um infrastructure that is the cradle of forestry has changed several times because of fire and expansion and and different things. Um, but it was really meant to be a place to connect people with some of the earliest ideas about conservation in the United States and to give them a sense of place in terms of where those things came from. And so you mentioned Dr. Shank. I love that you know who Shank is. That's awesome. But yeah, he and his students would roam around um the Pink Beds area specifically on horseback, and they were experimenting. They were trying

A Childhood Connection Comes Full Circle

SPEAKER_02 5:06

to figure out how to grow sustainably, harvest, manage, and maintain forested lands. And I just love to think about how organic that process was. And then later, how important it really turned out to be, you know, um, when Gifford Pinchot, who had actually been part of hiring Dr. Shank, teamed up with Teddy Roosevelt. And Shank was the very first head of the U.S. Forest Service. Many of the first forest rangers were people that were trained by Dr. Shank at the Biltmore Forest School roaming around Pisgah National Forest.

SPEAKER_00 5:43

It's amazing.

SPEAKER_02 5:44

Isn't that so cool?

SPEAKER_00 5:44

Yeah, it is. Yeah. And you think of just how big and broad the United States is and all the mountain ranges and everything else, and to know that all of that just started right here in our region, I think is pretty special.

SPEAKER_01 5:55

I agree.

SPEAKER_00 5:55

Yeah. So just so we kind of understand the relationship. So you have you have partnerships, you have collaborations, you have the U.S. Forest Service, and then you have, and who else? Who are else are some of the collaborators?

SPEAKER_02 6:06

Um the Army Corps of Engineers.

SPEAKER_00 6:08

Army Corps of Engineers.

SPEAKER_02 6:09

It's actually a a a pretty significant uh land manager in the U.S. for for recreation sites. And then we have in the past and will be in the future collaborating with the National Park Service as well. And then we've done some private land management too. So when it was still open, CFAIA used to manage Cascade Lake as well as some other private private opportunities too.

SPEAKER_00 6:31

Okay. So this group, CFAAIA, and now go uh find outdoors, was or is really that extension of the Forest Service and the Corps of Engineers for education and interpretation and kind of stewarding the land. Is that a fair way to say it?

SPEAKER_02 6:52

Yeah, I don't want to bore you with a lot of acronyms, but it's important to think about the vast majority of things that are happening in the Forest Service context on public lands are managed by partners by and large at this point. And so you see that even with Helene recovery, right? Yeah. Um leaders in Helene recovery in our area are um Pisgah Area Sorba, SAWS Find, um the Piscah Conservancy, groups like that. So as the Forest Service has changed in composition, partners have really stepped up to do things that the Forest Service used to do. Okay. Um and so deferred maintenance, uh especially on a lot of developed rec sites, is a big part of that. A lot of these places were built by CCC back in the day. And, you know, those weren't always skilled labor. And, you know, we have gone through periods of fluctuations in budgets for recreation. And so a lot of deferred maintenance comes from partners, a lot of trail work comes from partners. Um, and in our case, a lot of education and interpretation comes from partners. The Forest Service just quite simply does not have the bandwidth to do that anymore to the degree to which perhaps they did even when my best friend's dad was doing it. So Okay.

SPEAKER_00 8:18

And the work that you're doing is pretty broad because we both live here. You live in Transylvania County, I'm in Henderson County, but you are not just in North Carolina. That's not that's something that I really didn't realize until recently. So you're in Kentucky, you're in Georgia. Let's talk a little bit about sort of the breadth of not just the geographic regions, but all the different types of things you're doing in those areas as well, because we're talking about concessioner, we're talking about campgrounds, we're talking about a lot.

SPEAKER_02 8:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:45

Let's kind of break that down a little bit.

SPEAKER_02 8:47

Yeah, find is pretty unusual because many nonprofits, like if you go, for example, to the Public Lands Alliance conferences, you'll see a lot of friends groups there. And friends groups are so important, particularly in the NPS context. Um, but often the work that they're doing is education and interpretation and some retail sales that align with those interpretive themes. You don't often see those same groups doing direct management of developed or dispersed rec areas. So you're not going to see those same groups by and large do a lot of trail maintenance and clearing. You're probably not going to see them do a lot of campground management or um boat ramps and picnic areas, museums, other kinds of day use sort of stuff. But we do, and we're a nonprofit organization. Uh the vast majority of uh concessionaires that are working kind of in a similar space are for-profits. Nothing wrong with that at all. It's just a different model. Yeah. So we are able to put all of our proceeds from campgrounds, from retail sales, from day use fees, from um anything and everything back into either deferred maintenance. So big capital projects that have needed to be done at these places for a long time, or education and interpretation that hopefully connects people in some kind of meaningful way to that place and inspires them to care about it going forward.

SPEAKER_00 10:13

You know, there's something that you just said that struck a chord, and I've read it on some of your information. There's actually a great video that you all have, and I love the way that said this. It says, when you discover you connect, when you connect, you care, when you care, you protect. And that really kind of goes right along with what you just said,

The Cradle And The Birth Of Forestry

SPEAKER_00 10:30

and not to get too far ahead of ourselves, but that seems to be a lot of the work that you all are doing as well is connecting people with place, place with people, and then helping them kind of understand what these places mean, how they can recreate, and um yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:47

Yeah, no, you're absolutely right. I I think there's a vastness to our public lands. If we try to think about what's valuable in public lands in totality, it's overwhelming, right? But if you can get people interested in one small piece, maybe they're connected to the cultural story of some of these places. Maybe, you know, um, in the case of the cradle, maybe they're a family that's from Transylvania County generations back and their family actually homesteaded in pink beds. Or, you know, maybe they're connected in some way, they're interested in kind of the wreck experience part of things. Maybe they love the memories that they made with their family on Lake Blue Ridge when they were at Morganton Point. Maybe like the view shed coming up to Brasstown Ball, the highest point in Georgia, which we manage, maybe that's something that's iconic to their family or their town. Or maybe there's something in just like the biology. Maybe there's an experience that they've had where they got up close and personal with some species that was charismatic and and really cool to them. Um, if you can just give somebody a specific experience, then I just find that they're so much more willing to hear the broader story of why this matters, why we should care about it.

SPEAKER_00 12:01

Yeah. Oh, I love that. Absolutely love that. And uh something you said earlier to kind of tie into that too. You talk about the friends groups and the other nonprofits that are helping. You know, I think right here, if I'm not mistaken, just in our area, we've had two things, uh, two state parks. So one would be um South Mountain State Park that was really kind of started by Foothills Conservancy or a group that was looking to manage the land or protect to preserve the land. And then also I talked to one of the former rangers for Friends of Gorgeous State Park. And they were responsible for getting that state park kind of underway. Um, so it's definitely those people who are have an elevated sense of care for a place in the French groups that help to really kind of codify and solidify their space and and time, you know, with with with our lands. So you talked a little bit about Georgia, and there are other places in Kentucky as well, but there's also some really other a couple of really cool places in Georgia. I wonder if you can just kind of run through what some of those places are.

SPEAKER_02 13:03

Yeah. I mentioned Brastown Bald briefly. Brasstown Bald is the highest point in Georgia, and it's a former fire tower. So on a clear day you can see four states. Cool. Um, it's also part of the origin story for several of the indigenous tribes in that area. Nice. There's there are a lot of endemic, unique species in the wilderness around Brasstown that are found nowhere else in the world. Um, and those include you know, the tiniest isopod to rare plants that the Nature Conservancy and others uh travel far and wide to come and find and identify and check on and make sure they're still doing okay. Um, Brasstown Vault is is a really special and and unique place. We also manage Anna Ruby Falls, which is a rare double waterfall. So two creeks come together and form one waterfall. That's also where we have Fox Fire night hikes. Cool. Um, those are just absolutely incredible. And what I love about those experiences is they um bring people who are probably non-traditional public land visitors, um, and they're coming for a unique natural phenomenon and experience, and they leave really inspired. We manage Lake Winfield Scott, which is uh just an absolutely beautiful campground outside of suches. You feel like you're just driving into the middle of nowhere, which is one of my favorite camping experiences personally.

SPEAKER_00 14:29

Driving to the middle of nowhere. Yes, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:32

Like that's why you do it, right?

SPEAKER_00 14:33

Like I agree.

SPEAKER_02 14:39

But um, yeah, so uh it's really special and beautiful. That is a place, you know, we we do a lot with blue ghost fireflies at the cradle. But if you want to see more blue ghost fireflies than you've ever seen in your entire life, Lake Winfield Scott is the camp. Yeah, it's absolutely stunning. And then Lake Raben um in Raben County.

SPEAKER_00 15:00

Kind of just across the border, right? Yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 15:02

Yeah, not far at all. And then Morganton Point, which is on Lake Blue Ridge. Um, we do a lot of boat rentals there, the beach area as well. So kayaks and stand-up paddle boards and all that good stuff. And then also in Georgia, for the Army Corps of Engineers, we manage several sites within Carter's Lake, okay, which is the uh deepest lake in Georgia. So we've got the deepest lake and the highest point. So we're really covering all bases there. And Carter's Lake is really special. It's outside of Ellay, and so it's really not a far drive from here. But those campsites um at Wood Ring, for example, one of the campgrounds there, um, most of the sites are on a peninsula, so you've got lake views from both sides. Bald eagles just is you know, you you'd be hard pressed to go to Carter's and not see a bald eagle. No kidding. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:52

Any time of year?

SPEAKER_02 15:53

Well, probably not any time of year, but it's seasonal in nature. The campgrounds are. But um, yeah, so that's our Georgia footprint.

SPEAKER_00 16:02

Okay. And then you have a Kentucky footprint, which is really cool. You have at least a visitor center there, right?

SPEAKER_02 16:08

Yeah. Um, so we um run the Glady Cultural and Environmental Center, that which is at the the base of the Red River Gorge.

SPEAKER_01 16:16

Oh. And beautiful.

SPEAKER_02 16:18

Yeah. So that's um, if if folks haven't been, that's a good five and a half hours from western North Carolina, but it's the most sandstone arches this side of the Mississippi. It doesn't look like something that should be on the East Coast, quite honestly.

SPEAKER_00 16:32

I've never been. I've only seen pictures and I know people who climb, and that is one of their Red River Gorge is one of their absolute most favorite places to climb.

SPEAKER_02 16:41

Yes. You have to go. Oh, I do. Yeah. It's a it's a geologic area, and so petroglyphs and there's a uh there again, there is a lot of native history.

SPEAKER_01 16:54

Cool.

SPEAKER_02 16:55

Yeah. The the archaeologist that works with the Forest Service on the Daniel Boone National Forest, there's such a wealth of information about that history. But that's a place where there's not a lot in the gorge. And so I love that we're kind of the hub and nexus for trail information and safety information too. A lot of people do get hurt in the gorge from time to time. You mentioned it's a climbing Mecca.

SPEAKER_01 17:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:20

But it's on this beautiful piece of property backing up to the Red River, which is a national wild and um scenic river. And there's a cabin there, which is really the last standing structure of what was once a pretty thriving hamlet.

SPEAKER_00 17:35

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_02 17:36

Yeah. And so, you know, we were talking about kind of what connects people to place, and I think about Glady and how there's this cultural story, there's this story about local history, there's

Why Partners Now Do More Work

SPEAKER_02 17:48

the story about just the fascinating ecology, geology, and biology of that area. And so we really try to tell all of those stories to the d degree that we can in the museum space there.

SPEAKER_00 18:00

Oh, I love that.

SPEAKER_02 18:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:01

And then into North Carolina, where we are, obviously there's going to be a lot of places that people will recognize because they have visited or um have recreated there before, but you have a whole slew of places right here in North Carolina and western North Carolina specifically.

SPEAKER_02 18:16

Yeah. So of course the Cradle of Forestry, which is our flagship site and near and dear to my heart. We also manage the retail portion of the Pisca Visitor Center, so the main ranger station coming into the Piscah. Up in Highlands, we manage Cliffside Lodge and Van Hook Glade Campgrounds. And um in Yancey County, we manage Carolina Hemlocks and um Black Mountain Campground and Briar Bottom. Those have been closed for this year, um, but they'll reopen next year.

SPEAKER_00 18:47

So good.

SPEAKER_02 18:48

That's on schedule or yeah, it's on schedule. Um, so there is a lot of investment that those sites on the Appalachian district will get um between now and 2030. But the Forest Service, we're working closely with them to make sure that those repairs are completed in a way that one of those campgrounds will be open at all times. They're really important to the local community there. We were really proud to get Carolina hemlocks up and running for this season because that is the best swimming hole in Western North Carolina. If you've never seen a hellbender, your best chance of seeing a hellbender is going to be at Carolina Hemlock.

SPEAKER_00 19:26

No kidding, that's the place to go.

SPEAKER_02 19:28

That is the place to go. Such an awesome place to camp. And even just to go and take a picnic and swim for the day. You know, there are huge boulders that you can climb on. It's great for kids. Um, the water is a really special color there. And yeah, it's it's um Hellbender Central. Unbelievable.

SPEAKER_00 19:45

I did not know that.

SPEAKER_02 19:46

Yeah. I have a funny Hellbender story that relates to the cradle. So um there is a tank in the cradle that now we have two ambassador turtles that are there that are unreleasable. One was bitten by a dog and another was um hit by a car. Oh no. But I was asking Mike Malosh, who I've mentioned, what the tank was originally for. And he was telling me that there was some trout in it at one point. And then this just shows you how things have changed in terms of the forest service. Um, but uh he said his son Ben um caught a hellbender in the Davidson and took it to the tank at the cradle and they would take it out and it would crawl around on the cradle. No way. Yes. Isn't that just wild to think about? Um, and then they and it started to show signs of distress, and so they released it back into the Davidson. I was like, you did what?

SPEAKER_00 20:44

That's like back in the day when you did things.

SPEAKER_02 20:47

Yeah, and you that would never we would never, ever, ever do anything close to that now.

SPEAKER_00 20:52

But it's just so don't expect any uh hellbenders on leashes when you walk into the cradle?

SPEAKER_02 20:56

No, no, as much as we might maybe we can have a stuffed one or something or like in the gift shop.

SPEAKER_00 21:02

That's right. Oh, that's funny. That's funny. Well, so you've you've done a great job laying out all those different areas that you all is manage the right way to say it?

SPEAKER_02 21:11

Or like in the Army Corps context, um, it's a little different. It's a cooperative joint management structure. Okay. In the Forest Service context, it's you know, it's really similar to like a traditional concessionaire, except for we have this huge education and interpretation onus that usually isn't emphasized. And then at the cradle, we have what's called an expanded partnership agreement. So it's just a reflection of that deep and decades-long partnership that exists with the Forest Service to keep that place vibrant.

SPEAKER_00 21:41

Love it. And how do you add, how do you add more places to what you're managing? Is it the Forest Service or some of these other collaborative partners approaching you all about taking over the management of some of these spaces or helping them with the management? Or do you all pursue anything?

SPEAKER_02 21:56

It looks different in every place. And in terms of every site. So some of the sites that we manage are folks approached us to do that. So it's a non-competitive kind of a uh uh agreement. And then in other places we bid on things. Okay. Um so our main permit in Georgia, that was a competitive process that many other groups bid on. And there are RFPs that are published that anybody can look at that are put up by the Park Service and the Forest Service and others.

SPEAKER_00 22:29

Okay. Well, one thing that you mentioned earlier about connecting to place, you know, as I'm sitting here thinking and listening to you, you have all of these amazing natural resources and assets that are in three different states that you have. And then we've already talked about when people understand a place more, they tend to protect it or they bec they tend to become more champions of those places. And it's really kind of cool because like in your name, it's FINED, but it's also kind of an acronym, right? So it's forest-inspired nature discovery. And so my question is, and I'll try to not make this too big of a question, but the question is beautiful places, we know that that that when we get people connected to places, they love them more, they protect them more. Why is that important? Like, why is it, why should we even care about an area? You know, can I not just go there and just have a family picnic and just turn around and leave? Like what's the what's the reason and the importance for really helping people kind of understand an area and be more connected to the area? I think for you and I, that's probably a rhetoric question, but but why is that even important?

SPEAKER_02 23:37

I think it's important for so many reasons. I mean, one thing, I I do believe strongly and fiercely that wildness is its own excuse for being and that we don't need to justify it with how it's good for people. Um I enjoy knowing that wild places exist even if I never see them. It gives me peace. But I think that I think for me personally, the outdoors enriches my life. If I am not in a great place um in terms of my workload or just something going on in life or just the state of the world, and I find myself on a walk at the cradle, it really dissipates. It's like a fog lifting, you know. And I think too, there's a there's a benefit that we all have from understanding that we're connected from something much greater. You know, we're all part of something that's bigger than ourselves, and understanding

A Tour Of Sites Across Three States

SPEAKER_02 24:35

kind of all of those interrelationships is useful. And then, you know, there are straight pragmatists who look at what we have in this area and the economic impact of outdoor recreation and ecotourism as a whole, and say, well, this is why it's important, because it provides this number of jobs or stimulates this amount of tourism or whatever it might be. So I guess it's kind of like a a pick your poison. But for me personally, I don't really need those arguments. It's just like an intrinsic thing that I feel and know to be true.

SPEAKER_00 25:08

Yeah. Yeah. You know, it's interesting you say that because there's so much research that has been done on mental health and what being in nature does to us. But I feel like a lot of us who experience that and and look to the outdoors as that sort of a a medicinal fix, if you will. Pressure seems to dissipate, worries seem to dissipate, clarity seems to come, you know, when we're out there. And I really kind of feel like that is a an important part of this equation as well. I don't know if it makes any sense. But it's amazing that that now there's data there that that backs this up from the importance of us being in the outdoors for sure and discovering these places.

SPEAKER_02 25:53

Yeah, and uh you see that now, right? Like I've read news articles about doctors writing prescriptions for time outside, which is such a cool thing. But I I don't know, kind of in the grand scheme of things, it feels like wonder and awe are antidotes to despair in some way. And um, I think about like I mentioned the Foxfire night hikes that we do, and um, I think you probably heard me tell the story at the last outdoor business alliance meeting, but recently I was at Anna Ruby Falls and I went on one of the early season Foxfire night hikes. It's not true Foxfire for any purists out there, it's a bioluminescent gnat larva, but it's it's really incredible. And so there is a a new section of the trail where this gnat larva was especially bright this year. And walking through it in the dark, you you come up to it, and the the the best way I can describe it is it looks like a constellation. It looks like you're walking through a constellation.

SPEAKER_01 27:03

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 27:04

And I don't know when when you see something like that and experience something like that, wonder, awe, those are the only words that I can really find for it. You know, that thing that just stops you in your tracks and makes you take a breath and realize we live in an incredible place. And I feel really fortunate to be alive right now in this moment. And I think there's a lot of reasons in today's world that maybe we don't feel that way very often. And but I think it's really important.

SPEAKER_00 27:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:36

Foundational to being human.

SPEAKER_00 27:39

Yeah. Well, I was gonna one of the questions I wanted to ask you is how do you, you know, kind of turn one of those outdoor experiences that you all kind of offer and help people to experience these, these, these areas more into a lasting connection. And really you just gave a perfect example of it, I think. So, you know, you experiencing that, even though you have been in this area, you've lived in this area, you know, your your whole life, really. And now you're a part of helping other people experience these areas in a very intimate way, and yet you still find an experience that deepens your connection to the area, is what I just heard you say.

SPEAKER_02 28:12

Yeah, absolutely. And I think what what's really exciting is that I know I haven't experienced all the things that I will experience that will give me that feeling, you know. That's just the beautiful thing about where we are and the incredible ecological richness of this part of the world. People come from everywhere. People come from all across the country and all across across the globe to be part of what we have here. And we're just really lucky.

SPEAKER_00 28:43

Yeah, we are. Well, without question, we are. And do you find yourself after living here the number of years you have, that you don't ever really get fully used to that? Or do you ever find yourself just taking it for granted at times? I know I have an answer to the question, but I I'm curious to know what your answer is.

SPEAKER_02 28:59

I mean, I guess like everybody, I get caught in the day-to-day of I need to achieve these things and go here and go there, and you know, you lose touch with it from time to time. But, you know, I remember I read this book about mastery of things, like people who become masters of a specific subject. And it talked about how the key kind of differentiating thing between a lay person and a master or an expert of something is that if you have a deep and sustained interest that leads you into more and more granular details and you never stop being interested in it, despite how much you learn, you realize that you can go deeper into and like there's a l there's no limit to the things that you can learn. That's how I feel. And I get really excited about like taxonomy and just basic identification. And when you see something that you haven't seen in a super long time or ever, you feel that way all over again. And fortunately that happens a lot.

SPEAKER_00 30:02

Oh, I love that. One of the things that we have talked a lot about, we've used the word is public lands. What are public lands?

SPEAKER_02 30:11

Yeah. Um, so to me, public lands are our shared heritage. They are owned by all of us for the benefit of all of us. And so people don't tend to care a lot about the distinctions, although they're significant, between the National Park Service or the National Forest Service or BLM or USACE, the Army Corps acronym. But essentially these are places that are protected and managed for the public good in a way that is meant to be accessible and inclusive to all people. And I, you know, it's often called America's best idea. And I would have to wholeheartedly agree. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:51

Yeah, yeah. For sure.

SPEAKER_02 30:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:54

Oh, that's great. And so the public lanes that we have available here, any idea of just like the the amount of acreage that you guys are and I know it put you on the spot with a big question because you're covering three states and a bunch of areas, but yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:08

I couldn't tell you an exact acreage, but I can tell you even the cradles footprint alone, the congressionally designated portion of the cradle is not just the footprint of the cradle of forestry as a visitor center or as the trails. Um, it's a 6,500 acre area. That's big. Um, that was set aside for for the purpose of um historic preservation and continuing education.

SPEAKER_00 31:32

So, where do you see the future of GoFind? Or I keep saying go find because that's your your website. We say that. Do you say that? Okay. So where do you see the future of Find Outdoors and your connection to this place?

SPEAKER_02 31:45

Well, I think what we're seeing is that partnership is only going to become more important in the context of management of public lands. And I don't even, I don't know, maybe manage isn't the the right word because I don't just want to manage a status quo. I want these places to be getting better.

SPEAKER_00 32:06

Would steward be a good word?

SPEAKER_02 32:07

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Steward, improve. You know, I want to invite people to experience these places and to give them moments of inspiration and connection that last a lifetime. But I I think that there will only be more and more of a need for partnership, and especially kind of in the context of administrative changes that have happened with the Forest Service and the Park Service and other agencies. And so I think there'll be more of a need for us to be resilient and adaptable and true partners. You know, true partners are there through thick and thin. They iterate, they problem solve. You know, we have instances where things like that happen all the time. Last year, for example, we had a prolonged government shutdown and the Piscah Visitor Center, so the main ranger station, wouldn't have been able to open uh for over a month if we hadn't been able to figure out a way to make that happen. And that, and that's important. Um, well, it's important because it was unfolding over one of our busiest tourism seasons. But it's also important because in the wake of Helene, there's still a lot of road and trail close closures that the visiting public who may not even have a lot of awareness of Hallene or that we experienced this devastating event in the not too distant past, you know, just kind of the strain that it could potentially put on first responders if there wasn't somebody giving accurate and up-to-date information about safe places to visit. So I think what you see now is a lot of partners trying to be innovative, trying to be of service, trying to be helpful. And I think you're only going to see that ramp up in the case of Find, but also in the case of other partners as time goes on.

SPEAKER_00 33:54

So you when

When You Connect You Protect

SPEAKER_00 33:55

you mentioned you all still being able to be open, which was huge because a lot of places weren't, there's a lot of places that were were were closed, you didn't have staffing. That's one of the things that you all did. I know at least at the visitor center, I don't think you really did you ever close or I didn't think so. Yeah. I mean, you guys were you were doing it. Well, even though funds, I don't know if funds just weren't there or if they're just people were paid differently because it was a nonprofit.

SPEAKER_02 34:20

Well, so in the case of that specific instance, it's it was a matter of federal employees just were not allowed to it was not business as usual for federal employees. So the folks who unlocked the doors in the morning and managed the dozens of amazing volunteers who keep the Pisgah Visitor Center information desk active, they there was nobody there to do that normal work. So we were able to come in and help manage those volunteers, make sure the bathrooms were clean, make sure you know maps were stocked, all that good stuff. Um and we're just able to do that because we're a nonprofit that doesn't have to always follow a government shutdown. We have the flexibility to operate outside of those mandates that apply to federal employees. And so you also saw that, you know, in in Great Smokies National Park and in other places. You saw nonprofits like the Blue Ridge Parkway Foundation, for example, stepping up to make sure that other federal facilities that would have been closed because there was no Forest Service staff in the building at that point, that they they could stay open and important um resources for the public.

SPEAKER_00 35:39

Um, I mean, just pick a place on a map that was federal, you know, land. Do you know if the same kind of things were ex um were being experienced there where places were able to be held open even though the federal workers couldn't because of groups like yours?

SPEAKER_02 35:54

Absolutely. And I know a tricky thing is every shutdown is different and it impacts different agencies differently and guidance is interpreted differently in many different places. And so partners have to tap dance a lot to figure out what's possible and act quickly and kind of on the fly sometimes with changing information day to day. And so that's when I talk about partnership and what that means, I think our partnerships on the Pisca, especially, but even beyond the Pisca, are really, really precious to us and and they're a big part of why we do what we do. Um I believe in Ranger Dave, who's over the Pisca. I believe in Chris Sikorsky, who manages Developed Rec and in James Malone, who's the forest supervisor for all of North Carolina. And it's really a a blessing as a nonprofit that doesn't have the same constraints that they do to be able to come in and sometimes act in ways that they're not able to.

SPEAKER_00 36:55

Yeah. And and I've I've heard from other stories, and we've talked about the you know, the friends of the Gorgia State Park that that blessing goes both ways. So you all are very much as a blessing to them as as as they are to you. So it's the see the feelings seem to be very mutual along those lines.

SPEAKER_02 37:12

Yeah. I mean, I I think it's difficult to overstate how closely we work in partnership. And that might look like, you know, let's say uh public swim beach has an elevated E. coli testing in the water for a certain week. You know, we're on the phone constantly trying to figure out, okay, well, is this caused by excessive rainfall? How do we mitigate this problem? How do we get the beaches open and healthy? Or it might be, you know, hey, there was a huge uh storm and we have a number of hazard trees that are down that need immediate attention. Or it might look like, you know, this trail's been damaged and it's not as accessible as it used to be. How do we find either federal funding or private grant funding to change that and bring it back to a state of accessibility? So I mean it's it's daily. It's it is every single day for every single site. We're figuring out ways to tackle problems together with the resources that we both have to bring to bear.

SPEAKER_00 38:12

Wow. That's yeah. Uh I don't know how you could do it the more we've talked about this, other than being collaborative in your approach, because either one side, um, at some point you're going to run into a dead end and you're just not able to do much more. So you really do have to rely on each other.

SPEAKER_02 38:27

Yeah. And coming from like the same place of shared values, like us both understanding this isn't this doesn't belong to find, it doesn't belong to the Forest Service. It belongs to people. Love that. And we need to do everything we can to make it what it needs to be for the visiting public because it belongs to everyone.

SPEAKER_00 38:46

Talk about the future of public lands, just from your perspective. And it may be a lot broader than just, you know, here at Find Outdoors or the places you all cover, but just in terms of public lands, what's your sense of the environment right now?

SPEAKER_02 38:59

I think the environment right now is tough. You know, as humans, we don't like uncertainty, and there's a lot of uncertainty. And the one thing that does give me some hope is that it feels like public lands is as close to a nonpartisan issue as we can get to. Obviously, growing up in Appalachia, I have family and friends on sort of like both sides of the political spectrum. But everybody loves to camp, right? Everybody loves to fish. Yeah. Yes, yes, yes. And so I think that it's maybe an opportunity for more common ground than you can find in in other issues. Um, but I think the future is tricky and I think that it requires people to really be active and informed and continuing to engage in in meaningful ways. I know it's often hard to follow the news. Sometimes it just gets to be all too much. But yeah. Yeah. This is an area where advocacy does really work. You know, we talked about all of the arguments that exist for outdoor recreation and for public lands in general. And um,

The Future Of Public Lands

SPEAKER_02 40:08

you know, in this context, I think often the economic one is super effective and does work. And so recognizing that there are so many places in our communities and in our economies where these things are are not abstract, huge, amorphous issues, but are things that are hyper-local in many cases. And and there are opportunities to be of service and to volunteer and engage and be involved. Um that's what I hope is the future. Is I I hope that we haven't gotten to a place where we take these places and the fact that they are our shared heritage for granted.

SPEAKER_00 40:47

Yeah. Boy, I tell you what, I wish I could bottle that up and put it on repeat because that is that is so huge. I agree with you in so many levels. Stephen Foy and I were talking about this not too long ago, and we had the very same conversation about the outdoors and our public lands and our access to these things are not partisan in any shape or form. If they are, that's where the conversation stops. Like you're gonna run into a roadblock somewhere, but being able to come at this from both ends of the aisle or both sides of the aisle and to see this as they're important, they should be available, they should be accessible, and clean water, clean air, you know, clean places to recreate, those are almost non-negotiables. I mean, those are things that you know, we have certain inalienable rights, but golly, that I mean, our access to land has to be really, really high up on this list of these inalienable rights. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 41:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:41

And and that that's, I think for me, that's where I'm I'm finding myself these days of going, okay, how do we kind of come back to the middle? What's the plumb line in all of this? And and and what does it really require and what will it take of people of me, you know, to kind of come to the middle on this and and raise awareness because it's just so very important. I've shared this story a lot of a lot of times, but I remember uh when I was serving as a guide at the University of Tennessee Memphis, and I would have we would have people from all different socioeconomic backgrounds, different educational backgrounds, faculty, staff, people in the emergency room, students. And whatever your political beliefs were, or wherever your framework or wherever your filter you were looking at life through, the moment that we got them into the outdoors, it was shared experience, and everything else just kind of went away.

SPEAKER_01 42:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 42:32

And that's all that really mattered in that moment was just how are we experiencing this thing here together. And I think it goes back to something we talked about earlier too, about just what the outdoors does to our mental health. So we have that aspect of it, but but just even on our socioeconomic health, you know, people kind of I don't know, I I'm on a tangent now, but but but but you struck a chord in me, and I really think that's really important work. And anyway.

SPEAKER_02 42:57

Yeah, I think sometimes I consider what we were like before public lands. Like what did the Pisca look like before it was the Piscah? And I actually went to our local library's history room, which in Transvaini County, I have to say, is amazing. Cool. Laura Sperry is the historian there. She's absolutely incredible. But and I I so I went and I found the the original plot maps um where families were farming pink beds and the Pisga more generally. And I learned about kind of the legacy of logging and of tanning, um, and what those businesses were like and what what the Pisga might have looked like when Shank came to visit it for the first time, which we taught he talks a little bit about that in his um autobiography and his like very German way of doing so. But I I think sometimes what really strikes a chord for me is thinking about. That was a really bad time. I mean, if you go back and read about, you know, there were there were huge companies that would buy up huge tracts of land, clear-cut them, and then give them back to the government in lieu of paying taxes. Um, and the flooding and the fires that occurred because we didn't have forest science and and um because decisions weren't made from any kind of a place of of real knowledge yet. It was a dangerous world to be in. It wasn't as beautiful. Um, we didn't have these lush stands like we do now. You might go in the Pisga now and think, oh gosh, this is obviously this has been here for hundreds of years, and it has not. And so the the fact that we have that now and that, you know, we've learned sustainable yield and multiple use and how to balance those things meaningfully is not something to take for granted.

SPEAKER_00 44:56

I love that. So, how do you tie what you just said into thinking of the next three, four, five years of your work that you're doing and your you and your team's work and also the collaborative work that's being done right now? How does that translate into the future?

SPEAKER_02 45:13

I think that we have to be really nimble. If I were have if I were to have made guesses two years ago about what things would look like, particularly in the Forest Service now, I never would have been able to predict what's happened. And so I think, you know, just like I said earlier, I hope that citizens stay engaged and informed. That's what we have to do, and we have to constantly be looking around for where is our place to add value, to add service in whatever context we find ourselves in because things are changing really rapidly. You know, the the reorg, um, we don't really know the long-term implications of the Forest Service reorganization will be. We we don't know how some of these things will shake out, but what I do know is that um I want to work in partnership to make sure that the places I love don't fall through the cracks because absent of significant investment, some of these places are you know are at risk, I would say. Okay. And so we need to we need to be nimble in the present, but also thinking with an eye towards the future. So, you know, I mentioned Brasstown Bald earlier, which is such a such a special, special place. But Brasstown Bald, the infrastructure needs of that site, I could put 15 years worth of revenue into just Brass Town Bald and probably still have projects to tackle. And so we have got to do an excellent job of communicating what those needs are to the public, but also communication goes both ways. So listening to what people love about this place, what they want to see different, but also what they hope never changes.

SPEAKER_01 47:00

Oh, I love that.

SPEAKER_02 47:01

Um, and so we have to be listening, we have to be learning, we have to be communicating, and we have to be planning for, you know, what if the Forest Service is never funded at the level that it was 35 or 40 years ago? What if it's on us to figure out a way to keep these places vibrant and well maintained and available to future generations? If that's what our responsibility is, um, how are we setting up the structure for that to happen now, for that groundwork to be laid right now?

SPEAKER_00 47:33

What in your opinion, what does that look like?

SPEAKER_02 47:36

Well, very practically it starts with community sensing. Um, so it starts with sending our team members to the farmers market in Blairsville, Georgia to hear from people about what this place means to them. Um Yeah. It means working with the Forest Service to understand what's possible. It means um working with tribal liaisons to figure out what are their hopes for this place that means so much to their origin stories and indigenous cultures. It means figuring out if if it's a conservation finance model, if it's um Great American Outdoors Act funding or something else, Explore Act, or something else coming down the pike. How do we capitalize each and every opportunity that the Forest Service might have, that we might have as a private nonprofit that might be able to tap into philanthropic funding sources more easily than others potentially could? You know, so it's it's listening, coming up with a plan that meaningfully captures all constituent feedback and looking at kind of how do we reverse engineer financially and just from a timing perspective. How do we bring all of these pieces together into something that can reasonably make a difference in, let's say, a 10-year time horizon?

SPEAKER_00 48:55

Well, you know, not to patronize you, but everything you just laid out, I think you just so well hit the nail on the head. And it's no wonder that you're the president and CEO of Find Outdoors. And I know that it doesn't all rest on your shoulders and you would probably deflect some of that, but

How To Volunteer With Find Outdoors

SPEAKER_00 49:10

it really takes somebody like yourself to kind of be the champion. And um, I know there's a team of people that are around you for sure, but that is what you just said is so very well said. And it makes me wonder how do people like myself or a lay person get involved? You know, I I I'm hearing the listening and I'm hearing the communication piece. How does somebody kind of tap into that and how do they get inserted into this whole equation?

SPEAKER_02 49:35

Well, like all nonprofits, we need volunteers. And so um our the volunteers that give the most are our board members. Um so we're always looking for board members that reflect the diversity of the communities that we serve. That's really important. But not everybody has that much time to give. And so it might just look like volunteering on a committee, for example. It might be the marketing committee or the philanthropy committee or facilities and maintenance, which, you know, that doesn't sound like the sexiest thing in the world, but it's actually really so I think volunteerism is really important. Yeah, I think that's that's how that's how you get involved.

SPEAKER_00 50:12

So if somebody wanted to get involved, let's say a practical way right here with find outdoors. Should I say go find outdoors or find outdoors? I know we just had this conversation. Yeah. So if somebody wants to practically get involved in find outdoors today, after listening, what's the best way for them to do that?

SPEAKER_02 50:27

The the best way to do that is either to fill out uh the info form on our website, which is gofindoutdoors.org, or to get in touch with our amazing manager of community engagement. His name is Braden Vin Kil Hudson. Do you know Braden?

SPEAKER_00 50:41

I did well, I met him at the uh Outdoor Business Alliance event. He is so awesome. Oh gosh, yeah. Yeah, he is a ball of energy. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 50:48

Yeah, he is like if exuberance was a person, you know, he's just so wonderful. But he is really good at hearing ways that people want to connect and finding opportunities to do that. We've got a lot of local volunteers who are very connected to the story of the cradle and want to come and volunteer in kind of like an interpretive way. We've got people that just want to cut grass, you know. I love it. So we've got we've got many, many opportunities.

SPEAKER_00 51:15

I love that. I love it. All right. So go find outdoors.org.

SPEAKER_02 51:21

You got it.

SPEAKER_00 51:21

Okay. So perfect. And then obviously you're on socials, um, social media as well, Facebook, Instagram, all the things. And then they could find you all, they could call you, they could find your phone number on the website, or yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 51:33

And then, you know, I think people can stop by any of the sites that we manage and ask our staff for more information because every site has bespoke needs as well.

SPEAKER_00 51:42

Perfect.

SPEAKER_02 51:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 51:43

Well, Carolyn, it has been a wonderful opportunity to sit here and talk and unpack this. I knew after I met you in the first 30 seconds at the Creditle Forestry at the Outdoor Business Alliance, I turned to my wife and said, we have to have Carolyn on. That's so nice. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 51:57

This was really a pleasure, and it was really nice to hang out with you and your dog major. And thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_00 52:03

Yeah, well, yeah, thanks for putting up with him. If anybody has heard all the grunting and the he's a very vocal dog, so he's my rescue guy, and uh thank you for loving on him the way you have been.

SPEAKER_02 52:11

We're friends now.

SPEAKER_00 52:12

You're friends. You definitely are. You sat with you more in this interview than you did with me. Well, Carolyn, thanks so much. I appreciate you making the driveover. This has been so great.

SPEAKER_01 52:19

Thank you, man.

SPEAKER_00 52:20

There's a lot going on when it comes to our public lands, and I think conversations like this are important. Not only to understand how these places are cared for, but why our connection to them matters. Special thanks to Carolyn for joining me. I really enjoyed this conversation. Learning more about the work Find Outdoors is doing to care for these places, connect people

Final Takeaways And Next Steps

SPEAKER_00 52:40

to them, and helping create a deeper connection to the public lands we all share. Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you did, please consider leaving us a review as it really does help more people to find the channel. And be sure to subscribe to the show so you never miss an episode. You can also follow Exploration Local on Instagram and Facebook, and if you have an idea for a future episode or know a story that deserves to be told, I'd really love to hear from you. Feel free to email me at Mike at explorationlocal.com. Until next time, I encourage you to wander far, but explore local.