The weekend beckons...
...and your humble blogger is heeding its call. Thanks for tuning in, and here’s hoping you’re able to get out to somewhere special over the next few days.
A rarified weekend at Channel Islands national park, California
The Channel Islands are just across the water from Los Angeles and are home to small indigenous foxes and other native flora and fauna. Robert Knudson visited on the July 4 weekend last year.
“I had 15-minute stretches alone on rocky cliffs overlooking the Pacific and the beautiful seascape below. The wildlife was spectacular. I saw whales, dolphins, seals, sea lions, foxes, and even a Garibaldi (the California state marine fish). I got my fill of hiking and kayaking as well. All on one of the busiest weekends for parks! I cannot wait to return.”
San Francisco's drinking water, and others reasons to visit the backcountry of Yosemite national park, California
Yosemite is vast - there are 1,100 square miles of wilderness. Peter Lund recounts a hike he made to the Hetch Hetchy reservoir, which supplies San Francisco’s drinking water, with the Sierra Club:
“Apart from the first and last day, we never saw more than four people on any of the days we were out (seven in total). The mountain and lake scenery was spectacular throughout, though the midges were pestilential on some evenings.”
Lovely Lassen Volcanic national park, California
Lots of support coming in for Lassen Volcanic national park in northeastern California. It offers “epic views, a wide variety of landscapes from sulfuric pools to alpine meadows, and is practically empty compared to Yosemite,” writes commenter Mercury Ellis.
“Always one of my favorites,” adds dphaynes. “I’ve lived/worked in Yellowstone and I’ve been to every national park and nearly every national monument in the western US, so my standards are pretty high.”
Who’s to argue?
Pueblos and eruptions past: Wupatki national monument and Sunset Crater Volcano national monument, Arizona
Arizona isn’t all about the Grand Canyon, as commenter Veufveuve observes. A different itinerary might take in Sunset Crater Volcano national monument — it erupted in 1085 — and Wupatki national monument, renowned for its ruined pueblos.
“We had a wonderful day hiking in an almost deserted Sunset Crater Volcano combined with an afternoon at the enchanting archaeological site at Wupatki just a few miles away. It was that day that the desert really cast its spell over me.”
Among the ancients at Redwood national and state parks, California
Phil Williamson advocates for the delights of Redwood national and state parks in northern California:
“Walking in the true old-growth coast redwood forest is an experience like no other: the vast trees like huge red columns, the silence, the overwhelming sense of being in a truly primeval environment.
And not too far away from Redwood national park — about a 4-hour drive — is another of the most spectacular parks in the system, Crater Lake national park in Oregon. The view across the lake from the crater’s rim, when the water reflects the sky and clouds like a mirror, is one of the finest in any park, rivaled only by the Grand Canyon itself.”
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Everglades national park, Florida: alligators and other adventures
A constant theme in the comments we’re receiving: get out of the tourist traps and main drags in the most popular parks. (Writer Robert Leonard Reid said as much in his piece for us on Yosemite.)
Stephen Morrill describes a very special kind of experience in the Everglades, alligators permitting.
Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo
“In the summer it’s hot, humid, mosquito-infested and a bit of an acquired taste. From November to April, it’s balmy and beautiful and a treat, and I have gone a week at a time in winter without any bug spray. I know; I visit it almost every year. While the main Everglades is a flat plain of sawgrass, speckled with tree-covered hummocks standing like islands among the knee-deep water, it’s the western fringe that attracts me most.
The Wilderness Waterway — a 99-mile canoe trek that takes eight days to complete — is an incredible adventure. Where else may you canoe among bald eagles, other colorful birdlife, and sleep on chickees (wooden platforms scattered among quiet and scenic bays). In the freshwater areas you may see the occasional alligator; stay in the canoe and you’re fine.”
(P.S. Rachel Levin, who contributed to our main story, has written a brilliant book on what to do when you run into unsettling wildlife: Look Big: And Other Tips for Surviving Animal Encounters of All Kinds.)
Not your usual Cuyahoga Valley national park, Ohio
Located in a densely populated part of northern Ohio, Cuyahoga Valley national park, which traces a scenic and historic waterway, draws over 2m visitors every year.
Commenter clevelandbill writes:
“The Towpath Trail can get busy, but get off that and up into the forests, including the very best section of the Buckeye Trail in northern Ohio, and you’ll find surprising solitude, unbelievably located between two major cities.”
When the park service really gets it right: Pipe Spring national monument, Arizona
Like other of our commenters, Leighton Quarles is deeply informed about the nation’s protected places.
“I am a public historian and PhD student completing an administrative history of Zion National Park as a contract with National Park Service,” he writes.
He highlights Pipe Spring in Arizona as an NPS success story.
“Founded as a handy way-stop between Zion and the North Rim of the Grand Canyon when the park service was in its infancy, Pipe Spring does a really fine job of preserving Mormon history, presenting it to the public in rich context, and reminding anybody who comes here that Pipe Spring might be a Mormon fort but the whole monument is surrounded by the Kaibab Paiute reservation. It also preserves and showcases a rich history of Paiute and much older Native history, in collaboration with the Paiutes.
Pipe is a fast visit, is completely out of the ordinary, and shows what a fine job the park service can do with a site that could easily have been (and was for decades) a celebratory monument to Mormon and American colonialism.”
Another note of appreciation for Theodore Roosevelt national park, North Dakota
Douglas Brinkley penned a lovely piece for us in praise of this northern park as an alternative to Mount Rushmore, and reader Silvia Bonvini is in full-throated agreement.
“The landscape is so incredibly stunning: at sunset and dawn, looking down from a hill into the untouched nature, you really feel like you are in a fairyland. Bison and wild horses roam free and enjoy scratching their backs on the trail-marking poles, often taking them down. Small, muddy streams can appear in a fairly unpredictable way, and often cross the trails, so you need to be ready to take off your shoes and dive across!
It all makes hiking in the backcountry much more of an adventure than in most other parks. You may very well get lost (we did!) but in the park you are allowed to camp anywhere, and since it is relatively small you can easily find your way back to the road.
The only downside... is ticks. tons of them. But they aren’t the really mean ones.”
Desert splendor at Great Sand Dunes national park and preserve, Colorado
The most obvious destination in Colorado is the Rockies, but don’t stop there, writes Marion Delahaye, who visited from France:
“To get there from the west, we had to cross mountains and then farmland. As we were driving across this flat land, the dunes gradually appeared. First as a mirage, then growing bigger and bigger.”
The dunes span 30 square miles in the San Luis Valley, south of Denver.
Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo
Can't get Baxter State Park out of my mind, Maine
Deepesh Rana has sent some stunning pictures of Baxter State Park in Maine, which has been described by advocates as “a magnificent obsession” covering 210,000 acres about 215 miles north of Portland.
Rana says:
“The sheer backcountry feel of this place blew me away. All water bodies in the park are reserved for wildlife which adds to a true wilderness feel while you’re there. The hikes are amazing and almost always lead to stupendous views of Mount Katahdin — the towering northern terminus of the Appalachian Trail.
I visited the park over July 4 weekend in 2016 and was amazed at how relatively private our experience was. The park is a must-visit to experience true northeast backcountry wilderness.”
Wondrous geology: Capitol Reef national park, Utah
Capitol Reef is one of Utah’s Mighty Five (along with Zion, Arches, Bryce Canyon and Canyonlands). It’s firmly on the radar, with 1.2m visitors per year. Yet reader Fletcher Hill believes it still isn’t getting its dues:
Photograph: Larry Geddis / Alamy/Alamy
“There’s one park so saturated in peacefulness and beauty that it’s surprising many are ignorant of its charm.
Utah highway 24 crosses the waist of Capitol Reef national park as you’re heading east on your way to Goblin Valley or Green River. It looks like a nice picnic stop. But it is a geological wonder.
It has breathtaking canyons. The Fremont River gorge is stupendous. There are hanging canyon hikes, natural bridges, exquisite wind-weathered rocks. It houses incredible petroglyphs that connect the park to the Fremont Indian civilization that spanned central Utah when Augustus ruled Rome. The Wingate sandstone escarpment shares Zion’s colors while the reefs foreshadow those of the San Rafael Swell.
These are the easy things, accessible from pavement and gentle trails. For the more adventurous there are wondrous rewards in exchange for four-wheel hazards and primitive camping up in the Bentonite Hills and Cathedral Valley.”
Irresistible Biscayne national park, Florida
Denise R may be the perfect person to give the following recommendation. She was also kind enough to send us a photo...
“95% of Biscayne is water so it’s a great place for boating, fishing and snorkeling. I’m a park ranger here so will admit some bias, but who could resist a view like this taken from Boca Chita, one of the islands you can visit in the park?”
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Feeling expansive at Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Historic Park, Nevada
For Sofia Steinhagen, this park in central Nevada was a place to contemplate both large prehistoric marine reptiles and her own place in the universe.
Berlin-Ichthyosaur is the site of the largest-known specimens of ichthyosaurs, which lived in the sea that covered the Silver State 225m years ago. There’s also a well-preserved ghost town and cemetery.
“Imagine my surprise while taking a back road to Reno from Bishop, California when I spotted the little sign that saying “Icthyosaur”!! Standing on the edge of the Great Basin while gazing westward evokes a feeling of vastness when one imagines the ancient shoreline under one’s feet. I’ve been twice and will go again. Remote but so worth it.”
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The delights of Devils Tower, Wyoming
You’re in Wyoming. You’ve seen Yellowstone. You’ve taken our advice and hit up the Bridger-Teton national forest. Perhaps you should stop by that gigantic rock formation you’ve seen hovering above the landscape, suggests Roly Smith.
“It stands like a gigantic, fluted Doric column, rising a sheer 867 feet straight up out of the surrounding Wyoming prairies, and is a landmark for miles around. Such was its singularity, Devils Tower became the original national monument, established by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1906.
Long before that it was known to the local Sioux tribes as “the Grizzly Bear’s Lodge”, and the fluted columns were thought to be the result of the scrabbling bear’s claw marks as it attempted to climb to the flat, one-and-a-half acre summit. Modern geologists have more prosaic interpretations, believing it to be either the plug of a long extinct volcano or a shallow intrusion, or ‘sill’, of hardened magma that thrust through the surrounding sedimentary layers around 40 million years ago.
Either way, Devils Tower dominates the surrounding landscape like no other physical feature, and its architectural qualities made it the ideal first national monument. There’s a fine, stepped trail which will take you around the tower and an informative museum and visitor center at the entrance.”
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The lesser-known Acadia: Isle au Haut, Maine
Patricia Cole writes of a watery wonder in the northeast:
“Nearly half this beautiful, rugged island several miles off the Maine coast is part of Acadia National Park, but much less-visited.
You get to Isle au Haut on the Mail Boat out of Stonington, a gorgeous 40-minute ride among spruce-covered islands. There are many hiking trails on the island, including one up Duck Harbor Mountain where you have incredible views out over Penobscot Bay.
There are several park-maintained campsites at Duck Harbor, as well as one inn, the Keeper’s House, which was once just that for the Isle au Haut lighthouse . The Maine Lobster Lady has a food truck with amazing lobster rolls and other goodies, and there is a small but surprisingly well-stocked general store. Full disclosure: We spend the summers on the island and think it’s a very special place!”
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Valley of Fire State Park, Nevada
Our rundown of the 22 parks you should visit as alternatives to the Yosemites and Yellowstones of the world is comprehensive - but there’s a lot we couldn’t fit in.
That’s where you come in. Over the course of the day, we’d love to hear your own ideas and stories about stirring and evocative American landscapes that don’t receive as much love as they should. Please send them to publiclands@theguardian.com.
Our first is in from reader Sarah Richards:
“State parks are often overlooked, yet they offer rich alternatives to the national parks, especially at the height of the season. The Valley of Fire State Park is a stunning geological wonder in the Mojave Desert, a petrified valley of red sandstone eroded into forms that resemble flames. It has a variety of landscapes: open areas where the rocky outcrops float on plains of sage brush; slot canyons and arches; and trails that wind through red sandstone, white and pink limestone. There are sites where you can find petroglyphs 2-3,000 years old.
This wonderful place is less than an hour from Las Vegas. On the two occasions I visited the park, once in September (when there was no one there) and once in the summer season on the way to Zion (when there were a few people around), the sense of ancient geological time was tangible.”
One more picture because it’s so lovely...
(We’ll be editing these pieces for length and clarity.)
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Welcome, and follow along for readers' stories – live!
Welcome to our national park live blog! Memorial Day weekend is a time when Americans get outside to enjoy the nation’s glorious parks – but it’s increasingly clear that the most popular are struggling to handle the strain. Places like Zion and Yellowstone are overwhelmed with visitors.
We asked two dozen experts – from Ryan Zinke to Leslie Marmon Silko and Joan Naviyuk Kane – to suggest their favorite alternatives to the thronged favorites. Now we want to hear from you.
Do you have a beloved national park, monument, forest or wilderness that is underappreciated? We’d love to hear about it. Please send an email to publiclands@theguardian.com with a few lines explaining why your chosen destination is special, and what someone should see or do when they get there.
Starting Friday at 9am ET, we’ll be checking the inbox and posting a selection on this page throughout the day. We can’t wait to hear from you.
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