The American Towns Surrounded Entirely By National Forest

Most towns sprawl outward until they bump into the next town. A rare few do the opposite. Scattered across the mountains of the American West and beyond are small towns almost completely encircled by national forest, sitting as tiny pockets of private property inside millions of acres of federally protected woods. Locals call them inholdings, and the setup means the "suburbs" are old-growth timber, the neighbors are elk and black bears, and the town simply cannot grow past the tree line. Here are some of the American towns that national forest wraps around on virtually every side.

Telluride, Colorado

There may be no more dramatic example than Telluride. The former silver-mining town sits at the dead end of a glacial box canyon, which means the steep, forested walls of the Uncompahgre National Forest rise on three sides, with only the valley floor open to the west. There is quite literally nowhere for the town to expand, which is a big part of why it has kept its compact, historic character even as it grew into a world-famous ski and festival destination. Waterfalls tumble down the surrounding cliffs, national forest trails begin at the edge of town, and the peaks that hem it in soar well above 13,000 feet.

Silverton, Colorado

Deep in the San Juan Mountains, Silverton is a preserved Victorian mining town sitting in a high, remote bowl at over 9,300 feet, encircled by the San Juan National Forest. It is so hemmed in by mountains that its main link to the outside world is the famous, hair-raising drive over the passes of the Million Dollar Highway, or the historic narrow-gauge railroad that chugs up from Durango. With the entire town designated a National Historic Landmark and national forest pressing in on every side, Silverton feels frozen in the 1890s, an outpost of civilization in an ocean of alpine wilderness.

Greer, Arizona

For a town that truly is surrounded on every side, it is hard to beat tiny Greer. Home to just 58 people at the last census, this speck of a community sits at about 8,400 feet in the White Mountains, making it the highest town in Arizona, and it is completely enveloped by the 2-million-acre Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest. There is no through road pushing on to somewhere else and no suburb creeping outward, just a cluster of cabins and lodges along the Little Colorado River with national forest in every direction. Greer is the kind of place where the forest is not a scenic backdrop but the entire world beyond the last house, which also means wildfire is a constant concern, as recent blazes have shown.

Cloudcroft, New Mexico

Rising nearly 9,000 feet in the Sacramento Mountains of southern New Mexico, Cloudcroft is an alpine village marooned in a sea of pine, surrounded by the Lincoln National Forest. What makes it especially surreal is the geography: drop down the mountain in almost any direction and you land in the blazing Chihuahuan Desert and the white gypsum dunes of White Sands. Yet up top, Cloudcroft is all cool air, thick forest, and mountain trails, a green island floating high above the desert floor. The national forest gives the tiny town its entire identity as a summer escape from the New Mexico heat.

Red River, New Mexico

High in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, the old mining-turned-ski town of Red River sits at 8,750 feet in a tight valley completely surrounded by the Carson National Forest. The town is essentially one main street squeezed between forested slopes, with ski runs dropping straight toward the buildings in winter and national forest trails climbing out of town in summer. Its isolation is the whole appeal, a compact Old West streetscape with nothing beyond it but the peaks and pines of northern New Mexico.

Wrightwood, California

Barely an hour from the sprawl of Los Angeles, Wrightwood feels like a different planet. The small mountain town sits at around 6,000 feet in the San Gabriel Mountains, set within the Angeles National Forest and close to the San Bernardino National Forest, with the Pacific Crest Trail passing nearby. Ringed by pines and cradled beneath the Mountain High ski area, it is a genuine alpine town hiding at the edge of Southern California's megacity, walled off from the urban world by nothing but federal forest.

Leavenworth, Washington

Famous for reinventing itself as a Bavarian-themed village, Leavenworth owes its fairy-tale setting to the wall of mountains around it. The town sits in a narrow valley of the Cascade Range, enclosed by the vast Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest, with forested peaks towering directly over its rooftops. Those surrounding public lands are the entire point, feeding a year-round economy of hiking, rock climbing, river floating, and skiing. The Bavarian storefronts get the postcards, but it is the encircling national forest that gives Leavenworth its alpine soul.

Stehekin, Washington

If the other towns feel remote, Stehekin is on another level. This tiny community sits at the head of the 50-mile-long Lake Chelan, buried deep in the North Cascades and surrounded by national forest and protected wilderness on every side. There is no road connecting it to the outside world at all. To reach it, you must take a ferry or floatplane up the lake, or hike in on foot. The result is one of the most gloriously cut-off inhabited places in the Lower 48, a scatter of homes and a lodge encircled by some of the wildest, most heavily forested mountains in the country. For anyone who dreams of truly living inside the forest, Stehekin is about as close as it gets.