When you decide to find yourself your own wild spot you can suit on, pack the gear, jump in the car and drive where there are trees, then try to find a trail and follow it. It can lead to wonderful places but usually, you may not even find a trail or you will end up in someone’s backyard. Unfortunately, there is no terra incognita anymore.

Map of North America from 1566 showing Italian inscriptions, both Terra In Cognita and Mare In Cognito

If you are starting from scratch you may want to follow a method, here is a summary of my complete process for locating wild target area. For Urban Exploration, the process is roughly the same with less map analysis but more web search and reconnaissance.

Step 1: Check on Google Map to find a target area.  Actually “Google Map” itself is a pretty bad tool, I would rather use Gmap4 (most complete tool) or ACMEMap (lighter).  In order to save all my targets areas, I save mark points on Google Map Engine (Google Map with more tools, used to be much better, but we can still save the mark points to our Google accounts).
Target areas are usually zones with no road referenced. Roads are the key, for example, if you see a lake, with a road on its side … forget about it.

Step 2: Switch to Satellite view, not Google Earth, that way you can quickly switch from a view to an other staying at the same spot with the same scale.
Remember for aerial pictures: shadows must fall towards you in order to read the relief correctly (or else, valley will be perceived as hills).
Satellite view allows you to:

• Confirm that the area is wild or abandoned: check for buildings and roads that are not visible on Google map view
• Check potential access (path, river, lake, high tension line, rail road …) and closest parking spot.

ie: The above satellite picture reveals a lot of information on the target area. There is a clean stripe on the top right corner, this is a high tension line, and these always come with a service road. This road would be an easy way to get closer to the target area, unfortunately, there is already a cottage in the south west part of the lake. Fail!

Step 3: Check on Bing Map “bird’s eye” view: Bing does not display the same satellite pictures as Google, so it may reveal new interesting details on your target area. ie: Bing may display a high definition winter picture that will reveal much more information than a low definition summer picture on Google Map.

Google Map: Yes we can!                              Bing Map: No you can’t.

Step 4: Check/Switch to topographic view: Usually, a topo map will reveal factual information that can’t be guess out of a satellite picture. In order to be efficient, you may want to have a topo symbol & legend open, and try different topo maps (some are more detailed than others depending on the provider).

Step 5: Check on Google search: make few researches using the name of the area, if any. If it is very wild, you may want to write in the search box: the name of the closest point of interest between brackets and the name of the closest road. Input something like:

Hopefully it won’t bring results from real estate agency.

Step 6: Reconnaissance!: Input GPS coordinates you need in your navigation device, print the map, turn off the computer and move to the target zone with light equipment (binoculars, map, DSLR with zoom lens, fake mustache…). The purpose is to gain information about the environment and enemy forces for later analysis. Check your potential infiltration points, test them.

Bike is great for reconaissance

Talk to locals if any, torture them if they are not cooperating, they are information gold mines, ask: do you know this area? is it private? where is it ok to park? how often owners/rangers/village idiots are dropping by?  etc… it is important to know about the village idiots, once in while they go in the woods to drink beer, have fun and burn a stranger’s car (or just flat the tires down if you are lucky).
A GPS can help although usually, wild areas tend to be rather small. I use View Rangers it is a great app allowing to download and use topo map without connection and keep more satellite view in the buffer memory. Do not rely only on your Phone! Bring at least a basic map and a compass.

Step 7: Exploration! straight after the reconnaissance or later, come back with heavier equipment. Time for bushwhacking and wilderness navigation in pursuit of our own little wild paradise. First exploration is always the most exiting.

Remember to always set up a Search and Rescue Trigger System, even for reconnaissance.

Please, please, please, remember to collect ALL your garbage and respect the place. Please. I have seen so many places trashed, nothing is more depressing than a dump in the middle of the wilderness.

Anyway, If you have read, enjoyed, and understood the above, I am sure that you are a nice person who deserve to find its own, wild, sweet camping spot.

Good luck!

Addendum for Photographers, late sleepers and romantic Campers: You may want to get the (not free) Photographer Ephemeris apps. This is an app for Landscape Photographer that will help them to find when and where the natural light will come from based on a map position.
When you consider a wild camping spot near a lake, it is great to know if you ll get the sunset, moon rise and when the sun light will hit your tent in the morning (ALAP in summer, ASAP in winter).

Addendum for Canadian folks: there is an extra step to take before or together with step 1: check for Crown Land, they are areas that belongs to everyone (you have to be a Canadian resident though) where you can go and do (almost) whatever you want.

There is an official interactive map for Ontario which is quite a pain in the ass to use and understand but there is no way around it.