National Park of American Samoa

Wow. I can’t believe I’m sitting down to write about my final national park trip! This journey has been several years in the making. When I started, there were 59 national parks, and since then, 4 new ones have been added. I always hoped I’d make it to all the parks, but never knew if […]

Congaree National Park

Congaree National Park is located in central South Carolina, and preserves the largest tract of old growth cypress left in the world. The forest populates a floodplain of the Congaree and Wateree Rivers. The park contains the tallest of 15 species of trees, plus six national champion trees for their overall size. Only the redwoods […]

New River Gorge National Park

The morning of our fourth day, we ventured to West Virginia to visit America’s newest national park, New River Gorge. This national park protects and maintains the New River Gorge in southern West Virginia and the Appalachian Mountains. The whole park encompasses over 70,000 acres of land along the river, which offers an abundance of […]

Cuyahoga Valley National Park

Cuyahoga Valley became a national park in October 2000. It’s currently the only national park that originated as a national recreation area. The park is a refuge for native plants and wildlife. The Cuyahoga River, meaning crooked river, gives way to deep forests, rolling hills, and vast farmland. While visiting Cuyahoga Valley, we opted for […]

Mammoth Cave National Park

Mammoth Cave National Park preserves the longest known cave system- the most extensive in the world. No known cave in the world is even half as long. There is evidence that humans explored Mammoth Cave 4,000 years ago, but it wasn’t until 1798 that the cave was rediscovered. Mammoth Cave was established as a national […]

Theodore Roosevelt National Park

Theodore Roosevelt National Park encompasses the badlands of western North Dakota. This park honors Theodore Roosevelt and his presidency, which was marked by a legacy of conservation in our public lands. The park has two main units, North and South. The South Unit is the most visited and easily accessible, located near the town of […]

Glacier Bay National Park

Glacier Bay National Park encompasses 3.3 million acres of prestigious land and water. The waters in Glacier Bay are some of the richest on earth, and because of this, it’s one of the largest protected preserves in the world. It’s very common to visit Glacier Bay via cruise ship, and although cruises are able to […]

Wrangell St. Elias National Park

Wrangell St. Elias (WSE) is the largest national park in the United States. The park covers 13.2 million acres, and is home to 12 of the 20 tallest mountains in North America. It is 6 times the size of Yellowstone! Access to Wrangell St. Elias is difficult, but it is still technically one of the […]

Gates of the Arctic & Kobuk Valley

Welcome to the three-part series of Alaska’s National Parks, 2nd edition. This summer I explored four more of Alaska’s eight National Parks: Gates of the Arctic, Kobuk Valley, Wrangell St. Elias, and Glacier Bay. This was a much-anticipated trip, with lots of excursions and flights planned. We were traveling to all of these parks via […]

Mesa Verde National Park

Mesa Verde National Park is located in southwest Colorado. The Park is known for its well-preserved Ancestral Puebloan cliff dwellings. The cliff dwellings provide insight into the lives of the ancient people who once farmed on the mesa tops. After living on the mesa top for nearly 600 years, the Ancestral Puebloans began building dwellings […]