REI's flagship store in Seattle, I feel compelled to invite the author to my home state of Washington for a ten-day backpack trip through the North Cascades.

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Through the years, Brower had a profound impact on America's wildlands by helping to create national parks and seashores in Kings Canyon, the North Cascades, the Redwoods, Great Basin, Alaska, Cape Cod, Fire Island and Point Reyes.

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Blink and you will miss Mazama (population 230), little more than a gas station, a cosy mountain inn and a mercantile store that, between November and April, is the last stop on the road west when Highway 20 across the North Cascades to Seattle is closed due to snow.

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