Voices in the Wilderness – Savannah Willison

The first shooting star

I remember my outdoor experiences usually by their most memorable moment. Camping in an unexpected snow storm, getting an uncountable amount of blisters on my first backpacking trip, going on an epic canoe trip and being hammered by wind, seeing a grizzly bear 20 feet down a trail 40 miles from the nearest trailhead. All of these moments can define a trip into the backcountry.

One of my most memorable outdoor trip moments, that has forever stuck in my mind was a trip I took with my family when I was in elementary school. My family and I embarked on an epic adventure down Hells Canyon where we would float for an entire week through the desert cliffs and down complex white water rapids. This trip has many memories that stuck out to me but the most memorable moment was before we even pushed out into the water.

The days leading up to the trip were filled with the typical family cluster of getting 3 kids packed and ready, two dogs boarded, a week’s worth of food, beverages and games packed up, and a boat repaired and prepped to be tip top shape. Thinking we had passed every pre trip hurdle, we hit the road and drove to Riggins, Idaho, where we would caravan with one other family of 5, to meet up with the rest of our float crew.

Just as the sun started to set (we were of course, running late) a tire flew off the boat trailer and launched down a hill towards and the Snake River only a few miles outside of the nearest town and without cell service.

With no good place to pull over we were forced to stop in the middle of the highway and get out to search for the tire, and all the lug nuts. All the kids then wandered the road for an hour only to successfully find three lug nuts. After the adults got the spare on we proceeded to our camping spot at a snail’s pace arriving in the wee hours of the morning. The rest of our party was dead asleep and out of pure exhaustion my father laid out a tarp, threw down the sleeping bags and begged us to just go to sleep. I laid down and stared up at the sky too wired to sleep from the epic adventure of searching for a tire.

With the rest of the family asleep, I stared up at the sky in awe of the stars with my dad, and that’s when it happened, I saw my first shooting star! The pure excitement of it kept me up for even longer. There I laid on the ground, tired as all be but unable to sleep, snuggled up with my dad, watching shooting stars for as long as my eyes could stay open.

The adventure of just getting to the campground at the put-in was a precursor for how the rest of the week went, a week of adventure, beauty and lots of mishap, but I will never forget the feeling of seeing that shooting star, and the excitement of being just on the edge of adventure. This is a feeling that has since become familiar with every adventure I embark on, but none have felt the way seeing that first shooting star felt.

Savannah is the FSPW Programs Director – wrangling Trail Ambassadors and leading trail projects all summer long. She grew up in Boise and moved to Sandpoint with her partner in 2025 for the job! Prior to her role in the Scotchmans, Savannah worked for the Forest Service in the Bob Marshall Wilderness where she picked up all kinds of handy skills and adventure stories from workin’ in the woods.