Anyone who paid attention in their high school English class likely has some familiarity with “The Hero’s Journey.” It’s the template for most storytelling, wherein a hero goes on an adventure, is victorious (or sometimes fails) and comes home changed by it. But for Robert Michael Pyle, a real-life hero’s journey took place in 1995 when this accomplished lepidopterist set out on a 30-day trek through the Gifford Pinchot National Forest—also known as “the dark divide,” famously known as Bigfoot country—a place where tourists flock every year hoping to catch a glimpse of the famous sasquatch. Pyle received a Guggenheim grant to document butterflies and moths, which he did while still trying to process the trauma of the death of his wife from the ravages of cancer, chronicling it all in his book, Where Bigfoot Walks: Crossing the Dark Divide.
