You are here

A Shout-Out To The Chesapeake & Ohio Canal Trust

Share

The C&O Canal Trust, whose decal is gracing the Traveler's Rocketbox, is a non-profit working to preserve the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park.

Quick, can you name the national historical park that greeted more visitors in 2012 than Yosemite, Yellowstone, Grand Canyon and Grand Teton national parks, not to mention 383 other units of the National Park System?

If you closely read the headline to this post, then you rightly guessed the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal National Historical Park. By the end of 2012, the park had seen 4,712,377 visitors, enough to place the unit at No. 11 on the park system's list of visitation.

That's quite a crowd when you think about it. Of course, they were spread out along the park's 184.5 miles that wind through western Maryland and down into Washington, D.C.

Working to help the National Park Service maintain the historical park is the C&O Canal Trust, a non-profit that puts charitable dollars to work on projects as diverse as repairing a breach in the towpath at a place known as "Anglers" or working to pare vegetation encroaching on the Capital Crescent Trail, a rail-trail running from Georgetown to Silver Spring.

Along with tending to the towpath and natural resources along the canal, the Trust also helps the Park Service care for a vast number of historic structures -- more than 1,300 -- such as the lockhouses that dot the canal. In fact, thanks in part to the Trust you can actually spend a night in a lockhouse.

So the next time you find yourself looking to make a charitable donation, consider the C&O Canal Trust and the good work it's doing to preserve this historic corridor.

To help spread the word of the Trust's work, we've added their decal to the Rocketbox atop our Subaru Outback. Send us a decal of your logo and, if your organization is somehow tied to the parks, we'll add it to the box for all to see as we make the rounds of the National Park System.

Comments

An excellent group. The C&O park also supports long-distance trails that use the towpath for part of their route. The Appalachian Trail is one (3 miles between Harpers Ferry WV and Weverton MD). The Tuscarora Trail takes the C&O towpath for 8 miles between Hancock MD and Licking Creek. On the Great Eastern Trail you have a choice of an eastern loop from Hancock following the Tuscarora Trail route or a western loop taking the C&O towpath 20 miles upstream to Green Ridge State Forest. There's some beautiful, wild country on those trails.


Add comment

CAPTCHA

This question is for testing whether or not you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.

Image CAPTCHA
Enter the characters shown in the image.

The Essential RVing Guide

The Essential RVing Guide to the National Parks

The National Parks RVing Guide, aka the Essential RVing Guide To The National Parks, is the definitive guide for RVers seeking information on campgrounds in the National Park System where they can park their rigs. It's available for free for both iPhones and Android models.

This app is packed with RVing specific details on more than 250 campgrounds in more than 70 parks.

You'll also find stories about RVing in the parks, some tips if you've just recently turned into an RVer, and some planning suggestions. A bonus that wasn't in the previous eBook or PDF versions of this guide are feeds of Traveler content: you'll find our latest stories as well as our most recent podcasts just a click away.

So whether you have an iPhone or an Android, download this app and start exploring the campgrounds in the National Park System where you can park your rig.