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11/18/2009 - 10:56amReader Participation Day: Where is Your Favorite National Park Campground?Devil's Garden Campground in Arches National Park is my favorite. The expansive redrock scenery speaks for itself, but the absolute silence you can experience there is magical. Runners up: 1. Toroweap Campground at Grand Canyon National Park: Remote, silent and unparalelled in its beauty. 2. North Rim Campground at Black ...
09/16/2009 - 9:39amVarious Care-Taking Projects Under Way in Rocky Mountain National ParkWasn't the cabin work completed or mostly completed prior to the wilderness designation earlier this year?
08/28/2009 - 10:18amReader Participation Day: What Indelible Image Best Reminds You of the National Parks?These are the most indelible images of national parks for me: 1. Scenery along the Blue Ridge Parkway. Growing up in South Carolina, my family would take frequent trips to the Parkway on our vacations. Few places symbolize the National Park System for me quite like the Blue Ridge Parkway. ...
08/26/2009 - 8:14amAn Untimely Accident Fatally Injures a Colorado National Monument BicyclistThe crash occurred on simply the greatest stretch of pavement found anywhere in Colorado. I've cycled the East Hill on Rim Rock Drive at Colorado National Monument dozens and dozens of times, and while the descent can be intense because of the slope, the scenery and the traffic, it's quite ...
06/03/2009 - 9:44amNational Park System Quiz 57: CanyonsGreat quiz! The observance of Arizona time at Glen Canyon NRA's Dangling Rope Marina in Utah is interesting. I visited Theodore Roosevelt National Park over Memorial Day and became a bit disoriented by the time zone split there. The South Unit is on Mountain Time, while half of the north ...
05/13/2009 - 1:11pmNational Park System Quiz 54: AuthorsGreat quiz! Ed Abbey did time at Arches National Monument, well before it was declared a park in the 1970s.
04/30/2009 - 9:01amAccessible National Parks, Airline DivisionA few more to add to that list: Arches National Park's entrance is about 15 miles or so from the Moab/Canyonlands airport, which features direct non-stop commercial flights to and from Denver on Great Lakes Airlines. Add another 20 miles or so, and you'll be at Canyonlands National Park's Island ...
01/04/2009 - 6:43pmResolved: I’ll Visit at Least These Five National Parks in 2009If you're gonna trek from South Carolina to western Colorado, there are two other NPS gems you can't miss: Colorado National Monument near Grand Junction, where the six-mile roundtrip hike of Monument Canyon is one of the best on the Colorado Plateau. Rim Rock Drive is easily the best and ...
11/12/2008 - 4:43pmArches National Park Finds Its Birthday Overshadowed By Drilling ConcernsThis is all the more tragic because you can already see oil wells from famous vistas within Arches. Spend some time at the Windows at night, look west toward Canyonlands, and lo and behold, it's very easy to spot flames from two or three flaring oil wells that sit just ...
10/06/2008 - 9:13amPark History: Dinosaur National MonumentOf all our NPS-managed national monuments, Dinosaur most deserves to be elevated to national park status. Dinosaur, as you elucidate above, is an amazing place, an oft-overlooked gem of a park full of opportunities for adventure. It even features one of the top 10 largest natural arches in the world, ...
10/01/2008 - 9:02amPruning the Parks: Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area Was a National Park for Just Five YearsThe NPS apparently very much wants to keep Curecanti NRA, and currently has a plan out for public comment that would expand Curecanti and calls on Congress to officially designate the NPS manager of the public land surrounding Curecanti's three reservoirs. Curecanti, very likely Colorado's most inferior NPS unit, is ...
09/30/2008 - 9:38amAre There Really 391 Units in the National Park System? You Won’t Think So After You Read This!Interesting about Charles Pinckney. From the day they first opened the place to the public in the early 90's, that park has been a staple of the local high school history class field trip circuit. On my first trip there, probably back in 1993, the then-undeveloped park was conducting an ...
09/29/2008 - 1:32pmAre There Really 391 Units in the National Park System? You Won’t Think So After You Read This!About Fort Moultrie: Fort Sumter gets all the tourist traffic and Fort Moultrie sees a lot of locals. Indeed, Fort Moultrie is both a park and a very significant historic site. While I was in college, I used to take breaks from classes with a drive out to Fort Moultrie ...
09/29/2008 - 1:25pmAre There Really 391 Units in the National Park System? You Won’t Think So After You Read This!The National Park Service isn't the only agency guilty of toying with the public's perception of what is and what isn't an agency's unit and merrily confusing people. Here in Colorado, we have a variety of national forests that are combined for administrative purposes, and are referred to by the ...
09/19/2008 - 10:24amGone, but Not Forgotten: Shoshone Cavern National Monument Would Have Cost Too Much to DevelopHow about Yucca House National Monument in Colorado? Unexcavated, uninterpreted, virtually unvisited and unstaffed and managed by nearby Mesa Verde National Park, it seems Yucca House ought to be included as part of Mesa Verde, or developed such that there would be some sort of interpretation at the site to ...
09/12/2008 - 9:39amCanyonlands National Park, Still A Work in Progress After All These YearsCanyonlands National Park is the least visited of Utah's five national parks and is truly one of the great gems of the national park system. Near and dear to my heart, and perhaps one of the most threatened by energy development, Canyonlands deserves to be expanded to include the Glen ...
09/08/2008 - 2:08pmIt’s Good to be the President When You Visit Gettysburg National Military ParkA president OF the people has no right to be treated like a king, even in a national park. Such treatment is un-American. Three cheers, Bob!
09/08/2008 - 1:52pmYellowstone National Park Reporting Bullish VisitationI drove through Yellowstone on the way back to Colorado from a week in Glacier this last weekend. Despite claims of vast numbers of Europeans visiting Yellowstone in large vehicles, what was most striking was the vast number of Hummers and other belching SUVs from Texas and other Western states. ...
08/28/2008 - 12:30pmFlooding Nurtures Life in Congaree National ParkIf it's national park wilderness you're looking for, Congaree has a special, exceedingly rare brand of it. It's one of those places where you feel as though you're immersed deep in a jungle, tucked away beneath the towering loblolly and baldcypress canopy, ensconsed in a world absolutely alive with birdsong ...
08/26/2008 - 4:55pmThe Economist Warns that America’s National Park System is in Deep, Deep TroubleThank God national parks often have a reputation for being wilderness-challenged tourist traps full of the screaming, littering masses. That's why Colorado's Front Range residents often seem to avoid Rocky Mountain National Park, poo-hooing it as inferior to the Front Range's other wilderness areas and instead flock to the nearby ...
08/26/2008 - 12:18pmThe Economist Warns that America’s National Park System is in Deep, Deep TroubleWell said, Lone Hiker. I was born in 1977, and my Boy Scout upbringing has definitely rubbed off on my adult life (and those of my friends). I'd much rather go 'splore the wilderness than sit before a video game. Those "gamers" are totally foreign to me, much moreso than ...
08/26/2008 - 11:11amThe Economist Warns that America’s National Park System is in Deep, Deep TroubleAnonymous wrote: [quote]i realize the nps has a different mission statement than promoting recreation, but why should people pay taxes to support something they don't use? people won't protect, defend or pay for something they don't love or understand, if people stop using the parks at current numbers, i'd hate ...
08/22/2008 - 12:45pmA Century of National Parks in Utah To be Celebrated Labor Day WeekendThere are currently no proposals that I'm aware of to allow energy development within any of Utah's national parks, the possible exception being Glen Canyon NRA, where a proposal for exploratory wells was struck down a year or so ago. I'm not sure of its current status, however. That said, ...
08/21/2008 - 5:04pmPruning the Parks: Six National Parks Acquired via Transfer in 1933 Were Subsequently AbolishedAfter taking many South Carolina history classes in middle and high school while I was growing up in Charleston, the significance of Castle Pinckney was certainly under the radar and was hardly mentioned. It's a shame Congress turned it back to local government when it could have been protected as ...
08/21/2008 - 4:53pmA Century of National Parks in Utah To be Celebrated Labor Day WeekendI consider Natural Bridges to be one of the greatest units of the national park system on the Colorado Plateau. In celebration of this anniversary, I hope the federal government will begin to respect the national treasures we have in Utah and not abuse or destroy them with oil, natural ...
08/13/2008 - 11:54amWhere Are the Best Sunrises in the National Park System?For me, it's a toss-up between Bryce Canyon and Mesa Arch at Canyonlands. Sunrise at Toroweap at Grand Canyon runs a close third.
08/12/2008 - 4:27pmSierra Club Caught Standing Atop Mesa Arch in Canyonlands National ParkI agree we should keep as many signs as possible out of wilderness areas, but in national parks, especially at the head of the very short trail to Mesa Arch, signs in appropriate places are absolutely warranted. Ya gotta inform the masses in high-traffic areas somehow.
08/12/2008 - 8:30amSierra Club Caught Standing Atop Mesa Arch in Canyonlands National ParkMesa Arch is almost certainly the most accessible arch to walk across anywhere on the Colorado Plateau. It takes no effort at all, with the top of the arch only about 10 feet or so high, and, frankly, it isn't terribly intimidating. There are no conspicuous signs warning people to ...
08/11/2008 - 10:14amWhy You Should Not Store Food in Your Car at Great Smoky Mountains National ParkI grew up in the Carolinas and was a frequent visitor to Great Smoky Mtns NP and the surrounding national forests. Things may be different today, but the Forest Service and NPS did a pretty poor job educating visitors about the potential for bear encounters and their consequences. Bears were ...
08/10/2008 - 9:56pmIs It Time to Overhaul the National Park Service and the National Park System?National parks are considered playgrounds by those who recognize them as lands to be used solely for recreation (snowmobilers in Yellowstone, for example) without regard for the greater purpose of the parks' creation. Thus, (hopefully) as a marker of a paradigm shift in parkland management and a symbol of America's ...
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