Cue the classic 1968 song from Steppenwolf, the one everybody hears in their heads when they dream of hitting the open road to experience America in all its splendor…

Get your motor runnin’
Head out on the highway
Lookin’ for adventure
And whatever comes our way…

Music blaring, hit the accelerator — push it on down to the floor to get this journey started. We’re going to get out on the open road millennium style — takin’ an imaginative cross-country tour to drum up support for The Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009. Let’s call it The Virtual OmniBUS Tour ’09. We’re going to zip across the country from Washington state to Washington D.C. to promote a package of bills that represent one of the most important conservation measures we’ve seen in ages.

We’re talking about a package the U.S. House of Representatives will likely vote on in February that will do all kinds of great things. It will among other acts:

Designate more than two million acres of wilderness in nine different states.
Create three new units of the National Park System, a new national monument (a big ol’ chunk of nature — not cement in a city), and more than 1,000 miles of new additions to the national wild and scenic river system.
Establish the 26-million-acre National Landscape Conservation System.
This package of 30-plus bills has already passed the Senate and needs only House approval before it can go to the left hand of our new president. You can help make this happen in a variety of ways.

OmniBus Stops:

1. Washington Wilderness
2. Idaho’s Owyhee Canyonlands

Start by joining our Virtual OmniBus Tour. Hop off at Washington’s portion of the proposed Pacific Northwest Trail. Then come back to The Wilderness Society’s blog to read about more magical places that would be protected forever by the new legislation. We’ll go coast to coast without leaving even a trace of a carbon footprint.

There’s plenty of room on the bus so send e-mails to friends and family inviting them to hop on board.

Once we hit cruising speed, click here to take action to help the bill pass.

Get out your digital cameras and sit back and enjoy the ride across the country. It’s time to roll through some spectacular wild places. First stop — the Pasayten Wilderness in Washington. Hit it, Steppenwolf:

Like a true nature’s child
We were born, born to be wild …
Born to be wild
Born to be wild