The second day after reaching San Francisco, he wandered away alone into the wilderness. He heard Nature's bugle-call and was led on and on. He wandered far into the flower-filled distances, threaded the forests, and climbed the heights where wild cataracts leaped and where the glaciers had left their story. For forty years he spent the most of his time camping and exploring and studying in the wilderness along the Pacific Coast, chiefly in the Sierra of California. He neither fished nor carried a gun. He frequently went hungry; many times was without bedding; often he was entirely alone for weeks. These were glorious years! He rambled through parts of Nevada, Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia, and made five trips to Alaska. He also made visits to Australia, India, Switzerland, Sweden, South America, and Africa. Long and intimately he associated with Nature in the Yosemite National Park. He married in 1879, and for ten years devoted a part of his time to business, amassing a fair fortune. But in each of these years he managed to have several weeks in the wilderness. He had a large share in arousing the public interest that led to the creation of forest reserves. For years he splendidly led the movement for National Parks. His work and his writing glorified the scenic outdoors. In his Autobiography he says, "When I was a boy in Scotland I was fond of everything that was wild, and all my life I've been growing fonder and fonder of wild places and wild creatures." In his boyhood Wisconsin home he was so enraptured with Nature that, as he says, he could hardly believe his senses except when he was hungry or his father was thrashing him. In another case he says, "Every wild lesson a love lesson; not whipped into us but charmed into us." Commenting on leaving college, he declares, "I was only leaving one university for another, the Wisconsin University for the University of the Wilderness." Stevenson wrote, "There should be nothing so much a man's business as his amusements." John Muir's amusements occupied the major part of his life, and the result is an inspiring and ennobling influence on the world. More than anything else, his work is likely immeasurably to help the human race by getting us outdoors. While ever enjoying the beauty of Nature, he was continually searching for facts. He had the poetic appreciation of Nature. He was the greatest genius that ever with words interpreted the outdoors. No one has ever written of Nature's realm with greater enthusiasm or charm. He once said, "In drying plants, botanists often dry themselves." He also felt that "dry words and dry facts will not fire hearts." Much that he wrote is prose poetry or is enlivened with the poetic fire of his genius.