Regular readers already know that I frequently post articles relating to the wilderness, or to humankind’s primitive past, the theme of human isolation in nature. I do it because it is from this dark domain that the werewolf was birthed; it is there where the beast still dwells, whether one is peaking of a metaphorical wilderness or a conceptual one, one that exists inside the human subconscious, one that IS the human subconscious. If one wishes to experience the superstitious dread our ancestors felt, walking through a darkened woodland at night, it is still possible. The wild lands are still there, waiting, as is the dread. No matter how silly a person thinks the werewolf myth is, drop him off in the middle of some remote forest at night, with no modern technology, out there all alone, and let him hear the crack of a dry branch beneath a padded paw or the distant howl of a wolf. That man WILL shudder.
There are places one can seek out this kind of thrill even in “safe” locales like our national parks. Peruse this list and plan your next foray into the uncanny and primal. The denizens of the dark domain await you there; even if you are in actuality bringing them with you, carrying them inside your own mind, it is in such places where they escape to run free.
