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By the Numbers: Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park

Aug 15th - 13:23pm | Bob Janiskee

Thanks for the feedback, Bruce.  Glad you found the article interesting. I'm a history buff myself, as you might have surmised. In fact, I minored in history as an undergraduate and might very well have gone on to do graduate work in history had I not decided to pursue my first love, which is geography.

Aug 14th - 12:45pm | Bruce

Bob, it's articles like this that make me an avid National Parks Traveler fan.  I love our National Parks, of course, but I majored in history because I love it as well.  Not that I ever did anything with the degree, unfortunately.  These days, I'm in financial management.  ;-)

Aug 12th - 12:11pm | Bob Janiskee

I was in Skagway on July 17, Rick. Interesting place. Wish I could have spent more time there.

Aug 12th - 10:51am | Rick B.

What a nice surprise! When were you here, Bob?

Where Can You Enjoy The Best Wildlife Experiences In the National Park System?

Aug 15th - 13:20pm | y_p_w

Anonymous: Do not add to this list our parks are to crowded and being ruined by lists like this as it funnels everyone to the same place. Just look at supertopo.com Since it only has the best and most popular climbs, that is where everyone goes and it has ruined climbs and the enviroment!

Aug 14th - 17:43pm | Anonymous

Do not add to this list our parks are to crowded and being ruined by lists like this as it funnels everyone to the same place. Just look at supertopo.com Since it only has the best and most popular climbs, that is where everyone goes and it has ruined climbs and the enviroment!

Aug 14th - 13:41pm | y_p_w

I'd add the Tule elk along the Tomales Point Trail at Point Reyes NS. They have a favorite watering hole where there are always dozens of them - mostly females with one alpha male in the herd. http://www.nps.gov/pore/planyourvisit/wildlife_viewing_tuleelk.htm

Aug 14th - 10:44am | Brad G.

Nice article. I'd, however, just like to find a park this time of year that doesn't have any yellowjackets. :)

Aug 14th - 09:30am | Anonymous

Don't forget the wild horses at Roosevelt National Park. We saw about 20 of them close up in late June and they were spectacular.

Aug 14th - 09:29am | Gal Yellowstone

Big Bend for birds Yellowstone & Badlands for pronghorns Grand Teton for moose

Cumberland Island National Seashore Now Offering Interpretive Tours By Van and Open-Air Tram

Aug 15th - 13:16pm | RoadRanger

A clarification: the photo caption refers to Plum Orchard Mansion, but the photo shows the ruins of Dungeness, a Carnegie family home on at the southern end of the main road on the island. Based on information in the article, Dungeness should be on the motor tour.

Shutting Down Small-town Post Offices Could Make Things Tough For Appalachian Trail Thru-Hikers

Aug 15th - 10:57am | Anonymous

Will the NPS Become as Mismanaged at the USPS  ? with a reduced staff, wrong people selected for Top Management (Peter Principle: promoting people to their highest Level of Incompetence) apathy toward Science and Natural Resource Issues and solutions in favored bias toward Homeland Security,

Aug 14th - 21:06pm | Anonymous

I agree, most towns with a post office will have a merchant of some kind.  However, I would not depend on UPS or any other carrier to step in to replace these offices.  The Postal Service has been tasked with providing mail service to every citizen at the lowest price and for the same cost regardless of distance.  With congressional oversight and the Postal Rate Commission on it's back, problem

Aug 14th - 16:34pm | Anonymous

The US Post Office has been a study in corporate failure for several decades at least. Their over-paid upper-level managers have been among the worse as their own selected better employees will confirm.  A number of their window clerks are unfriendly and create a negative atmosphere.  At many small PO Offices, theIR window hours are shortened

Aug 14th - 11:19am | ecbuck

As a former thru-hiker (GA-ME 2002), I would say accomodating thru-hikers is hardly a good reason to keep open a money losing post office.  First, the numbers (of hikers)  just aren't that large.  Only a couple of thousand people start a hike and a third are gone before they hit Fontana Dam, 20% more by Harper's Ferry and when you get to Maine your down to a few hundred people.  Do we really wa

Aug 14th - 10:29am | Andrea Lankford

This would great an opportunity for the private sector to fill in the gap. I became weary of picking up food drops during my thru-hike and prefered to "forage" in trail towns. Without the post office in Fontana it will create a higher demand for food purchases in Fontana Village and I would expect the business to meet that increased demand.

Billy Malone And the National Park Service Investigaton At Hubbell Trading Post

Aug 14th - 17:12pm | Wind Change

Well, Owen, we're waiting for the epiphany to be received by NPS (or not).  I REALLY like to leave the door open for such an occurrence (and will).  The challenge for those in command is that so much has been invested in disfunction temptations to grease things into something quite less than transformation.

Aug 13th - 18:02pm | Owen Hoffman

Thanks to National Parks Traveler, this forum provides a mechanism for different perspectives to be voiced and discussed.  I understand the need for some readers to voice their opinions and concerns anonymously.  If there were not for the fear of administrative retaliation or social isolation by ones peers, it would be easy for those commenting to identify themselves.  Nevertheless, when there'

Updated: Yosemite National Park Rangers Investigating Reports Of Visitors Swept Over Vernal Fall

Aug 14th - 15:19pm | Darleen Murdock

My Son & daughter-in-law both worked in Yellowstone Nat'l Park for several years.  My Son has said time and again how amazed he is at peoples stupidity when using poor judgement in the Park.  He says it's as if the leave all good judgement at home!!  One visitor asked my Son where they store the wildlife at nite & if they are feed before release in the morning.  I feel terrible that the

Fans of Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore Being Asked to Contribute Ideas to Lakeshore's Future

Aug 14th - 13:44pm | G

The national lakeshore should make Kemil beach clothing optional. I've seen several nudists there in recent years and it doesn't seem to me that they are hurting anyone. They are usually secluded and minding their own business.

Update: At Grand Canyon National Park, an Abandoned Uranium Mine Must be Cleaned Up

Aug 14th - 12:58pm | Bryan

It's too bad the uranium had to be mined at all.  Then the mess wouldn't need to be cleaned up. Bryan

At Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Birds, Turtles, And Humans Have Created An Air of Controversy, Part II

Aug 14th - 10:30am | Crotalus

Correction to Ginny's claim. The NPS was/is prohibited from releasing run-off from the campground into the ocean by the NC Dept of Water Quality. It has nothing to do with "disrepair".

Aug 14th - 10:19am | Ginny

Sorry sir but the park's campgrounds do not need to be money pits.  We camped in the 80's when the campgrounds were part of the national reservation system and they were always filled.  I mean think about it.  Who is going to travel 8 hours or more without knowing they have a camp site secured?

Aug 14th - 09:51am | Ginny

DOW filed suit requiring USFWS to designate Critical Habitat for the Piping Plover.  DOW  secured a court opinion directing USFWS to designate Critical Habitat.  USFWS exempted Padre Island based upon economic impact but included Cape Hatteras and all emerging sandbars in Oregon and Hatteras Inlets. 

Aug 14th - 09:28am | Ginny

From the Enabling Legislation

Aug 14th - 09:19am | Crotalus

Kurt, There's an interesting study going on right now wrt the nesting population of sea turtles (see here: http://www.seaturtle.org/nestdb/genetics.shtml?program=1&beach=2 ) on the beaches of North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia.

Aug 13th - 16:56pm | Crotalus

Jack, Maps are published with the annual reports. (see here: http://www.nps.gov/caha/naturescience/natural-resource-reports-and-publi...)

Aug 13th - 11:22am | Jack

If the Park Service is touting the use of GIS to track and manage the Birds and Turtles, why aren't they disposed of publishing the Data and Maps from the previous years?   Is there something in the data that doesn't hold up to their spin on Resource Management???

Aug 12th - 15:32pm | Anonymous

      Page 19 of 38 of settelment agreement     38.   Attorneys' Fees: Federal Defendants agree that Plaintiffs' are prevailing parties and entitled to reasonable attorneys' fees and costs pursuant to the Equal Access to Justice Act, 28 U.S.C. 2412, up to and including the date of execution of this Consent Decree.

Issue Of Hunting Brown Bears At Katmai National Preserve Arises Again

Aug 14th - 10:26am | Bob Janiskee

Please don't refer to these guys as "hunters."  They are just shooters.  

Aug 14th - 09:52am | Anonymous

This doesn't seem to be hunting. It's more along the line of the parks making some money by letting people walk up to habituated bears and shoot them dead. Shameful stuff, turning the need to "harvest" bears, an interesting choice of words in itself into a sham shooting gallery of "hunters."

Aug 12th - 12:53pm | Betty H

I just sent my comments regarding what I consider as cruel as shooting animals in a cage !    

Statewide North Carolina Trail Nearly Completed on the Blue Ridge Parkway, the Video

Aug 14th - 10:22am | Brad G.

God bless these folks!  This is hard work and we often take for granted the labor of love that goes into providing for our Southern Appalachian hiking trails that are some of the best I've seen anywhere.  Thank you!

Aug 13th - 08:26am | Danny Bernstein

The trail goes from Clingmans Dome in the Smokies to Jockeys Ridge State Park in the Outer Banks, a 1,000 miles through North Carolina. Danny Bernstein www.hikertohiker.com

Aug 13th - 08:25am | Danny Bernstein

What a great accomplishment! Congratulations to all. The little piece still to be finished will be challenging as it will somehow go around Waterrock Knob - yes, with lots of rocks. But Friends of the MST, the Carolina Mountain Club and plenty of volunteers will do it. Danny Bernstein

Aug 12th - 19:18pm | Kate Dixon

Check out the Mountains-to-Sea Trail website at www.ncmst.org for more information and maps about the trail.

Aug 12th - 11:19am | Anonymously-yours

It sure would have been fun to see a map of where this trail starts and finishes. I live in the flatlands of Wilmington NC and this sounds like a great way to spend a vacation where there's some vertical diversity!

Aug 12th - 09:14am | atwillw

Many thanks to Randy Johnson and all the MST volunteers. I walked a section of the trail near Graveyard Fields back in July and really appreciated the trail route and the thoughtful attention to design.  

New Webcam Debuts At Mount Rainier National Park

Aug 13th - 18:37pm | OffDWall

Maybe it's not all about you. Maybe it's for people like me, a guy that lived in the shadow of the mountain for 30 years but now, thanks to an illegal crashing in to my bike without any insurance, I will never be able to snowshoe at Paradise, or walk the woods around Cat Creek and Ashford  again. Anyone that can look at that view and think it's cheap wouldn't have a clue anyway.

At Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Birds, Turtles, And Humans Have Created An Air of Controversy

Aug 13th - 07:28am | SS1

“SS1 
I believe the problem between you and I is that you dwell on the fact that everything I say is simply to bolster the orv side of the equation. And sometimes that is the case.” Yes that is a problem. I question your comments when they pertain to ORV issues at Cape Hatteras basically for the same reason you state,

Aug 11th - 14:45pm | Ron Saunders

SS1

Aug 11th - 13:47pm | samsdad1

"Maybe I’m mistaken but I took your previous posts to imply that you thought the turtle picture should not have been included in Kurt’s article."

Aug 11th - 11:16am | SS1

Ron,

By the Numbers: Affiliated Areas

Aug 12th - 18:53pm | Bob Janiskee

I don't know when the term Affiliated Areas was first used, or by what authority. Perhaps a more knowledgable reader can help? This is what the NPS has to say by way of defining Affiliated Areas: Affliated Areas: In an Act of August 18, 1970, the National Park System was defined in law as, "any area of land

Aug 12th - 18:16pm | Anonymous

What year did the NPS begin its affiliated areas program?

Coast Guard Called In To Help Rescue More Than 50 From Sinking Ship At Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore

Aug 12th - 12:12pm | Anonymous

What is even bigger news is that Sleeping Bear Dunes made it to the Top 10 in Good Morning America's Most Beautiful Places in America! Now everyone can vote to make it #1. Go to: http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/best_places_USA/

Aug 12th - 08:49am | Jon Merryman

Wow.  We are there today.  Will be sure to watch the boat from the relative safety of the dunes!

Aug 12th - 08:02am | Kirby Adams

This is deeply confusing that the boat at Sleeping Bear is named "Pictured Rocks". I couldn't figure out how the sunset was where it was if that was the south shore Superior. I'm OK now.

Yosemite National Park Officials Proposing To Remove Structures From Rockfall Zone

Aug 12th - 12:09pm | Steve Nelson

I'm glad I got to stay in one of these cabins before removal. It's too bad, but if someone was killed in Curry while they were asleep, what would we say then?

Reader Participation Day: What If You Could Wave a Magic Wand?

Aug 12th - 07:46am | tahoma

When the seemingly inevitable draconian cuts to the NPS budget arrive, my magic wand wave would reverse the historic pattern and have them start at the top of the bureaucratic food chain, where the corruption and incompetence are most concentrated. If I got a second wave, I'd move the Park Service out of the Sodom & Gomorrah that is the Interior Department.

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