Into the outdoors - getting urban children involved with nature through the Sierra Club Inner City Outing project - The Next Generation - Cover Story

Sierra, Nov-Dec, 1997 by Tracy Baxter

The natural world is a scary unknown to many urban youngsters. After a few tries, though, familiarity breeds content.

This is not the New Orleans I encountered ten years ago, when a primordial heat thickened perspiration into a gummy body sheath. The last 48 hours have seen temperatures no higher than 63, and the rain's so heavy it wraps around Kate's car like an endless car wash.

Our first stop is the St. Thomas public housing projects in central New Orleans. We pick up the Taylors--Dexter, Lucretia, and Nikia--and pack them into the backseat. Dexter is disappointed to hear that some kids won't be joining us because of the weather.

Our drive across the bonnet Carre Spillway and beyond is a 40-mile race with storms. Clabbering gray haze continually eclipses feeble patches of pale blue sky. "We need this to clear up so we can make it to Turtle Cove, you guys," Kate says.

"Dexter, you've got to wish hard for the clouds to go away." The girls snicker, Nikia demurs, "Miss Kate, I can't even stop a toilet from running." But Dexter isn't quite old enough to scoff at a sincere wish. He murmurs along with Kate for reprieve.

Since 1976, the Sierra Club's Inner City Outing program has brought wilderness experiences to children much more familiar with concrete compounds than open space. Nearly 14,000 kids last year took to the hills, or to the shore, or to somewhere in between, led by volunteers like our driver. Kate Mytron, Kate's a veteran of the anti-war and civil-rights movements, dedicated to "sharing the world." But the kids aren't the only ones who profit from the experience. "It's so incredibly rewarding, rediscovering what it feels like to see frogs for the first time," says one leader. "Days after trip, the volunteers still talk about the good time we had."

Off the Manchac exit ramp we slow down to look out for other members of our party. We roll up to Middendorf's parking lot for a pit stop but are shooed away by an approaching restaurant employee. He gestures broadly to power line downed by whipping winds. Nature denies nature's call.

A quarter of a mile ahead we see cluster of cars parked near a shack with a sign audaciously dubbing it "The Manchac Yatch Club." Nearby wait a passel of kids ages 7 to 14: John Kuss and his little brother. Clinton; the Webster sisters, Ronata and Danielle, and Shemeka Billo. The ICO leaders--Rogerwene Washington; Paul Bergeron and his teen son. Chad; Kate; and the director of the turtle Cove research station. Bob Hastings--all confer earnestly over the weather. The kids don't seem to be in a hurry either way. The clothes-snapping wind amuses those who brave it, while those who stay in the cars watch the spectacle of all that fluttering clothing; that, and a tumbling flurry of frantic sparrows overhead.

I feel winds intent on swatting us into Lake Pontchartrain. Kate detects a lull. Damned if she isn't right. Within 20 minutes we're packing a boat, tightening fiery orange life jackets, and chugging into newly quiescent, open water.

Bob's call for help in manning the boat is irresistible to all but our youngest: Clinton hasn't made this trip before, and he's not about to spend his time crowded around the steering console. He crawls over sleeping bags, peering into our faces as if to confirm that the speed and the spray do indeed combine to make this one truly glorious moment. He clambers to his feet, claps his thigh, and points excitedly into the distance. "Land ho!" he crows. "Land ho!"

We soon disembark at the Manchac Wildlife Area research station, which is administered by Southeastern Louisiana University. The green and white building, our home for the next 24 hours, was once a private hunting and fishing lodge. Its three levels have been converted into a lab, sleeping quarters and dining hall, and a classroom.

Students from SLU come here for field research in aquatic biology, much like we'll be doing, on our more modest scale. Rogerwene passes out pens and paper to catalog the flora we find traversing the first leg of the boardwalk. No sooner has she reminded the kids to be careful than we have our first horseplay casualty on the slippery boards of the canoe house. Danielle, a chatty imp, springs into the air and lands against Nikia, bringing the taller girl down flat. Adroitly stepping over her prone friend, Danielle innocently pronounces the obvious--"Ooh, she fell"--and skips off to join the others. I suspect Nikia is more surprised than hurt as she tenderly rubs the back of her head. Nor is she heartbroken when told to return to the station for rest, just to be on the safe side. Turtle Cove is old news to Nikia, and her gangly limbs and carefully placed twists of hair announce the birth of a teen with an associated disdain of kid stuff.

The others, though, are eager to explore. Sadly, the kids aren't seeing the original denizens of this water world. Logging companies, in a locust-like orgy of destruction, felled most of the cypress trees between the late 1890s and the 1950s. The few cypress here now, courtesy of an ongoing SLU restoration effort, are survivors of still another swamp bane, the red-fanged nutria, a rodent with an endless yen for saplings. A broad-leafed aquatic plant called bulls-tongue seems to dominate the marsh like a vast submerged herd of insolent bovines, but the kids' inspection turns up lavender iris, spiderwort, misty Spanish moss, and sundry colors, shapes, and fragrances--not to mention a panoply of bugs. Bob, the Turtle Cove director, calls us over to see what looks like a shivering mound of brown sugar on a piece of driftwood. When he tells the kids that the marooned ants are taking turns underwater so that they'll all have a chance to breathe, Danielle sees an excellent opportunity to work up a scare. "Ooooh, y'all," she coos. "Them's fire ants." But Lucretia, bringing into play her junior naturalist skills, disagrees. "No, they not. Them's sweet, sweet. I ain't afraid uh dem."