Tar sands mining, up front and grotesque

Heartbreaking, dehumanizing, toxic -- these aren’t the words most people would pick to describe the boreal forest of Canada. But in the far reaches of northern Alberta, this description seems accurate to me. This lush forest of larch, aspen and spruce –– a place where wood bison used to roam –– has degenerated to ravaged Mordor, the hellish land described in Tolkien's Lord of the Rings.

For the past two summers, I’ve made the long, nearly 1,300-mile trek from Boise, Idaho, to Fort McMurray, Alberta, to see the tar sands up close. I wanted to bear witness to the horrific scraping away of the land and to experience, even just for a moment, what it is like for the people who live with this industry in their backyard. But I didn't go there just to gape at the largest, most destructive industrial project on the planet: I went to walk.

The tar sands Healing Walk, organized and led by Canada’s First Nations people of the Athabasca region, began with a three-day gathering held mostly along the shores of Willow Lake. It featured workshops, local speakers and a glimpse into First Nations culture. This year marked the fifth and final Healing Walk.

The walk drew hundreds people from across North America, from Midwestern ranchers fighting to stop the Keystone XL pipeline to folks from Houston, Texas, who deal with the impacts of tar sands refineries.

In Idaho, we are struggling to stop these corporations from using the narrow, winding road along the Lochsa, a designated wild and scenic river, as a shipping corridor for their super-sized equipment. These “megaloads” are as long as a football field and weigh up to 900,000 pounds.

The Healing Walk itself started just north of Fort McMurray and follows a two-lane highway where traffic rivals that of a large metropolis. The Walk is not a protest, and no one carries anti-tar sands placards. Instead, we are focused on healing the land, water and people who are impacted by the tar sands industry.