Sep 26 2024
Mount Rainier National Park is best known for its enormous glacier-covered volcano, but the mountain is also the center of a remarkably diverse wildlife ecosystem. Black bears forage in forests and berry-filled meadows, elk move through valleys and open slopes, hoary marmots whistle from rocky meadows, and mountain goats navigate cliffs high above the park’s …
Sep 25 2024
Serengeti National Park is one of the world’s great wildlife landscapes, an immense expanse of grasslands, acacia woodlands, rocky kopjes, seasonal rivers, and open horizons in northern Tanzania. It is best known as the heart of the Great Migration, when enormous herds of wildebeest, zebras, and gazelles move through the wider Serengeti ecosystem in search …
Sep 24 2024
Mount Rainier National Park contains hundreds of miles of hiking trails ranging from gentle forest walks to demanding alpine routes beneath glaciers and snowfields. Trails climb through wildflower meadows at Paradise, traverse rocky ridges above Sunrise, follow glacier-fed rivers through old-growth forest, and connect remote wilderness camps on the 93-mile Wonderland Trail. The enormous volcano …
Sep 24 2024
Mount Rainier National Park is one of the finest places in the Pacific Northwest to see summer wildflowers. Each year, as deep mountain snow finally retreats, subalpine meadows burst into color beneath the enormous glacier-covered volcano. Lupines, paintbrush, avalanche lilies, bistort, asters, monkeyflowers, and dozens of other species transform slopes that may have been buried …
Sep 24 2024
The Skyline Trail is one of the signature hikes in Mount Rainier National Park. Beginning at Paradise, the route climbs through famous wildflower meadows toward Panorama Point, where sweeping views extend across glaciers, valleys, and several of the great volcanoes of the Pacific Northwest. The trail is not particularly long, but it is steep enough …
Sep 21 2024
Mesa Verde National Park preserves one of the most extraordinary collections of ancestral Pueblo architecture in North America. Built into sandstone alcoves high above the canyon floors of southwestern Colorado, its cliff dwellings contain stone rooms, towers, plazas, storage chambers, and circular ceremonial spaces constructed by people whose communities flourished in the Mesa Verde region …
Sep 21 2024
Mesa Verde National Park is famous for Cliff Palace, Balcony House, and its extraordinary Ancestral Pueblo cliff dwellings, but some of the best experiences in the park happen on foot. Nearly 30 miles of designated trails cross mesa tops, descend into shady canyons, follow historic roads, pass ancient farming features, and reach viewpoints overlooking both …
Sep 21 2024
Mammoth Cave National Park is best known for the immense labyrinth hidden beneath the rolling hills of central Kentucky, but its wildlife extends far beyond bats hanging from cave ceilings. Above ground, forests, ponds, sinkholes, streams, and the Green and Nolin rivers support white-tailed deer, wild turkeys, coyotes, foxes, beavers, owls, salamanders, turtles, snakes, and …
Sep 21 2024
Few places in North America offer a more extraordinary opportunity to see wild brown bears than Lake Clark National Park. Along the remote Cook Inlet coast of Alaska, bears gather in salt marshes, tidal flats, rivers, and streams where an abundance of natural food allows surprisingly large numbers of animals to live within the same …
Sep 21 2024
The plants of Kenai Fjords National Park grow in one of Alaska’s most dramatic environments. Glaciers descend from the Harding Icefield, steep mountains rise almost directly from the sea, and heavy Pacific precipitation nourishes lush coastal forests only a short distance from barren ice and rock. This remarkable variation in elevation, moisture, exposure, and glacial …
