Author's posts
Sep 18 2024
Best Things to Do in Hot Springs National Park: Bathhouse Row, Trails & More
Hot Springs National Park is unlike almost any other national park in the United States. Instead of surrounding a remote mountain range, canyon, or wilderness, the park rises directly from the center of Hot Springs, Arkansas, where historic bathhouses line the city’s main street and naturally heated spring water still flows from the slopes of …
Sep 18 2024
Wildlife of Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park: Native Birds, Nēnē & More
The wildlife of Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park is unlike that of almost any other national park in the United States. Thousands of miles of open Pacific Ocean isolated the Hawaiian Islands from continental ecosystems, allowing the animals that successfully reached these remote volcanic islands to evolve in remarkable ways. Native birds dominate the park’s wildlife …
Sep 18 2024
Haleakala National Park’s Bamboo Forest
Haleakalā National Park’s famous bamboo forest is one of the most memorable hiking experiences on Maui. Towering green bamboo surrounds a raised boardwalk, stalks sway overhead, and breezes create an unusual chorus of creaks, knocks, rattles, and hollow clacks as the bamboo moves against itself. The forest lies along the Pīpīwai Trail in the lush …
Sep 17 2024
Discover the Enchanting Waterfalls of Haleakala National Park
Haleakalā National Park may be best known for volcanic craters, spectacular sunrises, and the otherworldly summit of Haleakalā, but the park has an entirely different personality on the wet eastern side of Maui. In the remote Kīpahulu District, streams descend from the slopes of the volcano through lush forest, plunge over towering cliffs, and form …
Sep 17 2024
Haleakalā Sunrise: Best Viewpoints, Reservations & What to Expect
Watching sunrise from Haleakalā is one of Maui’s most famous experiences. Long before daylight reaches the beaches below, visitors climb more than 10,000 feet into the Summit District of Haleakalā National Park, where the first light of morning spreads across volcanic ridges, cinder cones, clouds, and the Pacific Ocean. On a clear morning, the experience …
Sep 15 2024
El Capitan in Guadalupe Mountains National Park
El Capitan is one of the most recognizable landmarks in Guadalupe Mountains National Park. Rising abruptly above the Chihuahuan Desert of West Texas, its massive limestone face marks the southern end of the Guadalupe Mountains and has guided travelers through this remote landscape for generations. At 8,085 feet above sea level, El Capitan is the …
Sep 15 2024
Wildlife of Guadalupe Mountains National Park: Bears, Mountain Lions, Birds & More
Wildlife in Guadalupe Mountains National Park is remarkably diverse for a landscape that can appear, at first glance, to be an enormous expanse of dry West Texas desert. Black bears roam high-elevation forests, mountain lions move silently through canyons and desert slopes, mule deer browse near springs, elk inhabit the mountains, and hundreds of bird …
Sep 14 2024
Best Hikes in Great Smoky Mountains National Park: 15 Trails to Explore
Great Smoky Mountains National Park contains one of the most extensive hiking networks in the National Park System, with more than 800 miles of trails crossing forested valleys, rushing streams, waterfalls, grassy balds, historic settlements, and some of the highest mountains in the eastern United States. Choosing where to hike can be difficult because the …
Sep 14 2024
Celestial Splendor: Stargazing at Great Sand Dunes National Park
Great Smoky Mountains National Park contains one of the most extensive hiking networks in the National Park System, with more than 800 miles of trails crossing forested valleys, rushing streams, waterfalls, grassy balds, historic settlements, and some of the highest mountains in the eastern United States. Choosing where to hike can be difficult because the …
Sep 14 2024
Wildlife of Great Sand Dunes National Park: Elk, Bears, Birds & More
Great Sand Dunes National Park may be famous for enormous mountains of sand, but the dunes are only one part of a remarkably varied ecosystem. Elk graze across the broad San Luis Valley, mule deer wander through wooded foothills, black bears forage along mountain streams, bighorn sheep move across rocky slopes, and mountain lions travel …
