About 68 miles of the Snake River is Wild and Scenic, and the prime activity here is white-water rafting. Hells Canyon itself and the Oregon side of the Wilderness are managed by Oregon's Wallowa-Whitman National Forest. A small portion of the Wilderness in Oregon is managed by the BLM . On the Oregon side, the higher elevations are thinly treed with occasional dense stands of Douglas fir and ponderosa pine. The lower elevations are dominated by grasslands.
Clear creeks dissect the isolated Oregon side.
A trail from Dug Bar follows the Oregon side of the Snake River and gives access to several other trails. The Idaho side of the Wilderness, which lies in parts of Nez Perce and Payette National Forests, is smaller than the Oregon side. On the Idaho side, the Seven Devils Mountain Range dominates the high country, a land of peaks towering 9,000 feet up, rocky slopes, and alpine lakes. The lower elevations are dry, barren, steep slopes that break at the canyon's rim. More than 1,500 archaeological sites have been identified here, and federal law requires that visitors leave them undisturbed.