Visit Wilderness

Search for a wilderness as the destination for your next outdoor adventure.

Bob Marshall Wilderness Area, Minnesota

Why Visit Wilderness?

While wilderness can be appreciated from afar—through online content, television, or books—nothing compares to experiencing it firsthand. Activities like camping, hiking, or hunting allow you to fully enjoy the recreational, ecological, spiritual, and health benefits that wilderness areas offer. These areas provide “outstanding opportunities for solitude or a primitive and unconfined type of recreation,” chances to observe wildlife, moments to renew and refresh, and the physical benefits of outdoor exercise. In many wilderness areas, you can even bring your well-behaved dog.

Learn more about the diverse ways in which we benefit from wilderness and threats wilderness areas face today.

The Oregon Badlands Wilderness holds a number of remarkable and exciting landforms and geologic features.

Most of the area includes the rugged Badlands volcano, which has features of inflated lava. Windblown volcanic ash and eroded lava make up the sandy, light-colored soil that covers the low and flat places in these fields of lava.

Dry River, active during each of several ice ages, marks the southeast boundary between two volcanic areas – Badlands volcano and the Horse Ridge volcanoes. Earth movements along the Brothers Fault Zone have faulted and sliced up the old Horse Ridge volcanoes but not Badlands volcano.

The Badlands formed in an unusual way. The flow that supplied lava to the Badlands apparently developed a hole in the roof of its main lava tube. This hole became the source of lava that built a shield volcano that we call the Badlands (technically, a rootless shield volcano). An irregularly-shaped pit crater at the top of the shield marks the site where lava flowed in all directions to create the Badlands.

It is located about 1,500 feet northeast of milepost 15 on Highway 20. Highway 20 traverses the shield along a straight, five-mile stretch between the intersections with an old section of Highway 20 (between mileposts 12.6 and 17.5).

Soils in the Badlands were largely formed from ash associated with Mt. Mazama, now known as Crater Lake.

A variety of wildlife species inhabit the area including yellow-bellied marmots, bobcat, mule deer, elk, and antelope. The southern portion of the Badlands Wilderness includes crucial winter range for mule deer.

Avian species include prairie falcons and golden eagles.

Leave No Trace

Visitors to the Oregon Badlands Wilderness can help in protecting this fragile desert ecosystem by adequately planning their trip and by arriving prepared. Knowledge of the area, weather, terrain, limitations of your body, and common sense can help to ensure a safe trip. Trail junctions are unsigned, so visitors should carry a map.

Walk Abreast When Walking Cross-Country. When off-trail, single file traffic creates entrenched social trails which detract from the sense of solitude; the single passage of feet tends to heal more quickly in the wind. Stock animals are allowed only on designated trails.

Dispose of Waste Properly. Pack out and do not burn or bury your trash. Do bury human waste 6 to 8 inches deep at least 200 feet (about 70 adult paces) from camp. Equestrians should pack home trailhead and staging area horse manure.

Minimize Campfire Impacts. Burn only dead and downed wood no bigger than the diameter of your forearm. Do not limb trees - they are an essential part of the Badlands Wilderness experience.

Protect Cultural Resources. Should you happen upon a pictograph or artifact, observe and enjoy it - in its place. Touching, marking, tracing, or otherwise disturbing can cause irreparable damage.

Leave What You Find. Leave rocks, plants, artifacts, and what even appears to be old junk as you find them.

Protect Natural Resources. Carving of trees, vandalism, and graffiti is illegal. Observe wildlife from a distance. Do not follow or approach them. Never feed animals. Feeding wildlife damages their health, alters natural behaviors, and exposes them to predators and other dangers. Control pets at all times.

Personal Technology. Although useful in emergency situations, cellular phones, GPS receivers and other devices may impinge upon others’ wilderness experience. Be considerate of others as you use electronic devices in the wilderness.

Location

The Oregon Badlands Wilderness is located approximately 12 mile east of Bend, Oregon, along State Highway 20.

Maps

Digital and paper maps are critical tools for wilderness visitors. Online maps can help you plan and prepare for your visit ahead of time. You can also carry digital maps with you on your GPS unit or other handheld GPS device. Having a paper map with you in the backcountry, as well as solid orienteering skills, however, ensures that you can still route-find in the event that your electronic device fails.

Online Maps

Interactive Map of the Oregon Badlands Wilderness
Google Earth

Oregon Wildernesses

Printed Maps

Fetching MyTopo from Database

USGS Store

Rules & Regulations

Motorized equipment and equipment used for mechanical transport is generally prohibited in all wilderness areas. This includes the use of motor vehicles, motorboats, motorized equipment, bicycles, hang gliders, wagons, carts, portage wheels, and the landing of aircraft including helicopters.

Wilderness-Specific Regulations

Learn more about why regulations may be necessary in wilderness.

Contacts

Applicable Wilderness Law(s)

Public Law 111-11

Date: March 30, 2009
Acreage: 29,301 acres

Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 - Public law 111-11 (3/30/2009) An act to designate certain land as components of the National Wilderness Preservation System, to authorize certain programs and activities in the Department of the Interior and the Department of Agriculture, and for other purposes.

For more information (To download or see all affected wilderness areas) visit our law library for 111-11 or special provisions for 111-11 or legislative history for 111-11.

Want to Volunteer for Wilderness?

People who volunteer their time to steward our wilderness areas are an essential part of wilderness management. Contact the following groups to inquire about volunteer opportunities. Groups are listed alphabetically by the state(s) in which the wilderness is located.