For our second summer in a row, we spent close to 2 weeks in Alaska visiting national parks. While last year we rented a car and drove around the state, this year we mainly traveled by air (including several bush planes) to reach our destinations, as none of these national parks can be reached by road. We started in Juneau, then stayed in Glacier Bay National Park for 2 nights, then went to Anchorage to take a day flight to Lake Clark National Park, then flew to Fairbanks t

For this trip, we flew into Denver, Colorado, to get to Rocky Mountain National Park, less than a 2-hour drive away. We stayed just outside the park in Estes Park, a really quaint town with lots of options for lodging and dining (and a couple of brew pubs!). After a day at Rocky Mountain NP, we flew out of Denver to Salt Lake City and drove 3.5 hours across the salt flats to Ely, Nevada, about an hour away from Great Basin National Park. Ely is the closest city to the park

The National Park of American Samoa is one of the most remote and least visited national parks in the United States, although it is well worth the effort to travel to, as we consider this tropical paradise one of the most beautiful places we've visited. There are flights to American Samoa from Hawaii a few times a week, but we opted to visit the park by way of cruise ship from New Zealand. We took a Celebrity cruise that departed from Auckland with several stops in New Zeal

View of Lake Michigan from Indiana Dunes National Park In the fall, we did a quick visit to Indiana Dunes National Park on the southern shores of Lake Michigan. The park is easily accessible from Chicago (a little more than an hour from Chicago O'Hare airport) but we decided to stay in South Bend, Indiana, for this trip, as we had never been there and it was less than an hours' drive to the park from there. Indiana Dunes is the fifth smallest of the national parks and its p

Goose Island in Saint Mary Lake, Glacier National Park Many people have told us that Glacier National Park is their favorite park and the...

Sunrise in Denali National Park Our most recent trip took us to Alaska, where we visited four of the eight national parks in the state as...

Near the entrance and visitor's center at the South Unit Theodore Roosevelt National Park comprises three units that are distinct from...

As we’ve previously mentioned, there is more than one way to travel to the National Parks. For this trip, we flew to Honolulu and boarded...

Voyageurs National Park is in northern Minnesota along the border with Canada and is the fifth least-visited national park in the lower...

Isle Royale is the least visited park in the lower 48 states, but according to the park ranger, it is the most re-visited by those who...

We thought the dog days of summer would be a great time to visit some of the northernmost national parks in the lower 48 states--Isle...

This is a description of our visit to Mount Rainier National Park, including trails we hiked and general conditions.

This is a short description of our trip to North Cascades National Park, including hiking trails we took.

This is a short description of our visit to Olympic National Park.

This provides the basic itinerary and route to visit all three Washington state national parks.

Description of sights and hikes in Death Valley National Park and Valley of Fire State Park

Description of visit to Joshua Tree National Park

Description of trip to Channel Islands National Park.

Trip to see Southern California National Parks, including Channel Islands, Joshua Tree and Death Valley.

Summary of our visit to Yosemite National Park