LOS ANGELES -- Jellystone Park isn't far from the Great White North, as far as Dan Aykroyd is concerned.
"It reminds me of where I grew up in Canada," the 58-year-old star says, referring to the scenic vistas (actually New Zealand) in Yogi Bear.
"I grew up on the edge of a national park. I could walk to school two miles, there and back, and that's when I would watch Yogi, in the afternoon, after walking through this park: timberwolves, creeks, snowdrifts, a bad highway ... The only joy was coming home at 4:30 as the light was fading in Hull, Quebec, and there was Yogi on TV. I always had an appreciation for nature."
And it's something he says he's passed onto his own children. That said, he realizes the grandeur of the great outdoors is increasingly lost on today's tech-savvy youth.
"I would say put up the texting, put up the Blackberry, put up the laptop, get rid of it for at least a long weekend or four or five days once or twice a month," Aykroyd says. "It's time to get back to nature, to see that there are other creatures out there, other than our friends who are being texted and sexted."
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