This lodge in the Oregon wilderness is anything but wild

Minam River Lodge is a rare piece of private property within Oregon’s 360,000-acre Eagle Cap Wilderness, which itself is located within the 2.3 million-acre Wallowa-Whitman National Forest. It was founded as a hunting camp in 1950 and even today the only ways to get here are to hike, ride a horse or have local rancher Joe Spence fly you there in his three-seat Cessna 206.

Once at the lodge, which is open from late May into October, there is no cellphone reception, Internet or television; power in the cabins and main lodge comes from an array of solar panels near its organic greenhouse and pigpen.

Eagle Cap Wilderness has 535 miles of trails and 17 peaks taller than 9,000 feet. Much of the Wallowa Mountains, called “the Alps of Oregon” and pronounced WAH-lau-waa, are in the Eagle Cap. Four rivers that run through the wilderness are in the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System, including 39 of the Minam River’s 51 miles.

Ninety-nine percent of guests hike in from the Moss Springs Trailhead, which, at 8 1/2 miles away, is the closest trailhead. But you can also start at the Wallowa Lake Trailhead. This allows you to see dozens of high alpine lakes and some of the range’s tallest peaks, but is substantially longer in time and distance then the trek from Moss Springs.

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