A Few of Our Favorite Things

This is it folks, the answer to the question we are asked most often: “which park was your favorite.”

I’ll cut to the chase and tell you that we didn’t have one favorite park – at least not one that all family members agreed on.  The best we could do was create favorite park categories where we had a high degree of family alignment.  After a year in the parks, they feel a little bit like family members and while we all have some family members that are more fun to hang out with than others – we generally appreciate the quirks and originality of all members of our family.  Forcing us to choose our favorite makes no sense – the family unit matters as much as the individual.

Another bit of preamble; what you get out of a park visit is directly correlated to what you put in.  This is true in life, of course, but I think it is especially true in the parks.  We tried to give each park its due, but we rarely got to spend the time we really wanted to spend in each park.  That trip would have taken us years to complete! Take Zion for example, we spent a magical morning hiking through its famous Narrows.  That barely counts as a visit.  Even in parks where we spent days exploring and hiking various trails – we left wishing we had a little bit more time to visit something else.  My point is that one’s favorite park is probably a moving standard based on recency and depth of exploration.

Lastly a note about what is missing on this list: the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  Smoky NP is the number one most visited park in the United States and has been since 1990.  In 2019 it received 12.5 million visitors.  It is a spectacular park and one in which Dan and I have spent days backpacking both together and alone. It’s also where we took our girls on their first multiday backcountry expedition at the ages of 7 and 10. I am guessing the reason it didn’t make our list is because we consider it our backyard.  We have spent the last 14 years of our lives bracketing the Smoky’s – first in Tennessee and then in North Carolina.  So to us, the Smoky’s feel like an entitlement and we take it too much for granted.

Ok, the list…

Best Park for Spectacular Hikes – Rocky Mountain National Park and Badlands National Park

The Rockies are a bit of a gimmie for any list – scenery, photography, wildlife, water features, etc.  But for us, it came down to hiking.  The Rockies are classic hiking.  With three distinct hiking zones, montane, subalpine and alpine, it offers something for everyone.  Hikes span the difficulty level too – you can take an easy amble around a clear mountain lake or try for Long’s Peak.  On this trip we split the difference, opting for a medium difficulty 6+ mile hike that took us along a river, over rock strewn paths lined with wildflowers and up to a clear lake nestled in a mountain junction. We didn’t get far off the beaten path, but the path was beaten for good reason, it was really beautiful. If you do want to get off the beaten path it’s easy to do here.  Dan and I have taken some multi-day backpacking trips during which we encountered only the occasional hiker. 

Badlands is Hazels choice.  While I wouldn’t put Badlands under the heading of classic hikes – it did have something really appealing.  Badlands is one of the very few parks that allows visitors to walk wherever they like.  There are a few well used and marked trails but most of the park is a free hike zone – you can takeoff in whatever direction you please.  Scramble up any butte that beckons you and put your tent in any spot that calls your name.  We never got a clear answer on why the Park Service takes this approach in the Badlands, but we enjoyed the freedom, nonetheless.  Hazel in particular felt drawn to this unstructured approach to exploration – she loved the fact that she could literally go anywhere – no rules.  Sums up our youngest very well!

Best Park for Animal Encounters – Glacier Bay National Park

Yellowstone is the classic park for animal encounters and probably would have made the list if it hadn’t been for our detour to Alaska.  Alaska wasn’t on our original plan – we were limiting ourselves to the 50 parks in the contiguous United States.  But it proved too tempting to ignore when we realized we were a quick flight away from Seattle.  Glacier Bay is the easiest park in Alaska to access and was the experience of a lifetime.  I can’t imagine how spectacular Kenai Fjords, Denali and the other Alaska Parks are.  Beyond the magic of glaciers (and they are magic) Glacier Bay offers up spectacular wildlife encounters.  Ava said it best “ [in] Glacier Bay you can see all the animals you’ve only ever seen in pictures.” We saw Brown Bears (aka Grizzly Bears) eating salmon on the shore, Puffins making their comical flight across the bay and seals resting on ice flows.  We even saw a porcupine waddle its way under our cabin one evening at the park lodge.  We saw whales, dolphins, mountain goats, sea lions, otters and more.  We saw so many animals it felt like we were in a sort of reverse zoo – the animals all came out to see the boat with funny one-eyed humans (our fellow passengers sported some spectacular telephoto lenses).

Best Park We’d Never Heard Of – Great Basin National Park, Capitol Reef National Park and Redwoods National Park

This was probably the widest variation in opinion.  Dan and Ava teamed up on Great Basin, I put in for Capitol Reef and Hazel listed Redwoods. For Dan, Great Basin earned top marks for its isolation and potential for further discovery.  You don’t happen upon Great Basin.  Located in the Great Basin Desert, in the easternmost part of Nevada, the Park takes planning to get to.  Even in the height of summer there were very few visitors – Dan’s ideal park.  For Ava I think Great Basin combined elements of other parks into one.  It has a wonderful cave.  Not as big or grand as Mammoth or Carlsbad but maybe more fun to explore.  It has miles of interesting alpine trails, some of which go through groves of the oldest trees on the planet.

It is hard to tease out why Hazel picked Redwood, she can be a girl of few words!  But having watched her experience the park I am guessing she picked it because it made her feel so small.  Until you see those trees up close it’s hard to grasp how small we truly are.  City skyscrapers don’t have the same effect.  Both girls experienced much of the park in near silence – an uncommon reaction up to that point on the trip.  When we hiked through the Cathedral Grove we didn’t have to tell the kids to talk in a low voice, they didn’t talk at all.  The trees rendered all of us mute.

For me, Capitol Reef topped the list for several reasons.  First, Capitol Reef made me feel like an explorer.  Compared with her sister sites in southern Utah (Zion, Bryce, Canyonlands, Arches) Capitol Reef is a relative unknown.  Its possible to gaze out at the park from an elevated point and see no evidence of human impact – to feel what it must have felt for Native people or for early European explorers to look out at the majesty and isolation of creation. Second, it has some spectacular canyons.  And lastly, I am a gardener deep in my soul.  A group of Mormons settled the Capitol Reef valley about a hundred years ago and planted orchards.  Those orchards still stand today, and the park service encourages you to harvest whatever is in season.  For our visit, apricots were in season and we picked 6 pounds of them one evening while dusk settled on the park.  It was an enchanting experience connecting us to an earlier generation of Americans that loved this part of the word. 

Best Park for Stargazing – Theodore Roosevelt National Park and Death Valley National Park

We could have put a dozen parks on this list.  Most of the parks out west had excellent stargazing.  26 of the parks have earned the International Dark Sky designation. These are parks that offer “an exceptional or distinguished quality of starry nights and a nocturnal environment that is specifically protected for its scientific, natural, educational, cultural heritage, and/or public enjoyment.”  Ironically, Teddy Roosevelt isn’t one of them – but it offers spectacular skies nonetheless.  I think most of us voted for this park because our visit happened to coincide with their annual stargazing festival.  We spent a long evening in an open field amongst amateur astronomers gazing through their telescopes at specific planets or just taking in the entire sky frosted with stars.  It was a moment of trip serendipity. 

Hazel choose Death Valley, which does happen to be a Dark Sky Park.  The Death Valley sky was enormous, framed by the dark mass of mountains that encircle the valley.  The vast sky was beautiful at night.

Best All Around – Glacier National Park, Yosemite National Park

This was a TOUGH one. At least a dozen parks fit the bill. We could have easily added Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, Rocky Mountain and Grand Teton to this list. We settled on these only out of a sense of obligation to our blog if I am being honest!  Dan and Ava picked Glacier, I picked Yosemite and Hazel refused to answer (smart cookie!). 

We all loved Glacier.  It really does have a little bit of everything.  If you are the car touring sort, nothing beats Going to the Sun Road.  It is gorgeous – both a scenic and engineering wonder.  If you hazard a look down from the passenger side on the way up, it encourages a feeling someplace between awe and panic.  You might see clouds gathered under you or a 1,000 ft vertical drop into the forest below.  The wildflowers in August are alpine splendor at its best and if you are lucky you will wander onto trails lined with thimbleberry – a tasty relative of the raspberry.  If you are even luckier your trail will lead you to a bear sighting.  Ours came on a quiet, forested trail strewn with mossy boulders.  There s(he) was, ambling across the trail about 30 feet in front of us.  Standing about 5 feet tall at the shoulder it was unperturbed by our presence and kept nosing at the ground looking for something tasty.  Glacier boasts not one, but three historic lodges on the National Historic Register.  You can hike popular trails or get lost on backcountry trails inhabited by wildlife.  There are classically beautiful rivers, the gorgeous Lake McDonald and glaciers you can still hike to.  If you are enamored with waterfalls, there are plenty of those too. 

I loved our visit to Glacier.  But when push comes to shove, it has to be Yosemite for me.  I think our experiences in life are largely about expectations which might be why Yosemite surprised me as much as it did.  Often, the highest of expectations are tempered by reality.  It’s hard for the event, place or person to live up to whatever romantic notion we have created in our minds eye.  And I had plenty of romantic notions about Yosemite.  El Capitan, Half Dome, Tuolumne meadows, Hetch Hetchy – many of these landmarks meant something to me even though I had never visited the park before.  I mean Yosemite is John Muir’s park!  Of course, it had to be spectacular.  Well it lived up to every expectation I had – and it did that in the middle of a relatively snowless winter – not its most charming season.  I can’t wait to go back and really see Yosemite – with a pack strapped to my back and a 3-4 day itinerary through the back country.  Next time I want to visit during summer to see the valleys covered in wildflowers.  I know they will be covered in tourists too – but its not difficult to get away – just pick a path, any path, longer than 4 miles and you have most parks to yourself. 

Honorable Mention – Acadia National Park

It just doesn’t feel right to leave out Acadia National Park. The only place in New England bearing the official National Park designation, we all loved Acadia. If I was forced to give this a category it would be something like “most family friendly” or ” best getaway with friends.” Ava thinks it should be categorized under “most things to do.” This is the park for city people! You can bike over miles of immaculately maintained “carriage paths,” and finish the day eating a lobster dinner out of a bag while watching the sun set. Or you can knock out a strenuous hike in the morning and finish with a 4-star meal at one of Bar Harbors restaurants. Lots to do here for everyone – bring or rent bikes – I can virtually guarantee you will love this park.

How to visit our National Parks

A few tips for those that are thinking about making a park their summer destination. 

• Get the heck out of your car (and I only said heck because my mother-in-law is reading this!) I know this blog has readers of all abilities, so this isn’t commentary on ability as much as commentary on attitude.  If you have limited mobility you can still get a lot out of the parks.  You can take scenic byways, go on short and often accessible ranger hikes.  You can take a small watercraft out into the bayou or take a ferry into the bay.  We found creative ways to wheel and crutch Ava through several parks this spring.  If you don’t have limited mobility, then for heavens sake park your vehicle.  The parks are best experienced, not seen.  Nothing drives our family of 4 more insane than being stuck behind a slow-moving traffic train in a National Park – it really defies explanation in all but 2 parks.  The first is Glacier – going 15 miles an hour up Going to the Sun Road is an event in and of itself.  The second is Yellowstone, if a bison is in the road, you stop because the alternative is bad for you and the bison (worse for you).  Beyond those two parks, no excuses.  Walk, touch, smell, see.  Lift your face to the sun – walk down to the rivers edge and see how long you can keep your toes in the frigid water.  Strip down to your skivvies and go for a dip in a lake (Phelps in Grand Teton was our preferred destination!), take as many pictures as you can, look for bears.  Parks should be a full body experience, not a windshield experience.

• Go early, go late. The parks had 327 million visitors last year.  As best we can tell most of those visitors visit between 10:00 am and 4:00 pm.  100% of the time it is worth dragging yourself out of bed before the sun rises to hit the trail early.  Sunrise in the park is always enchanting – you get to experience the ephemeral moments of dawn – the lightening sky, quiet illumination of the mountains, wildlife shaking off sleep. Even when we passed on a sunrise opportunity, we generally hit the trail well before 9:00 in the morning.  You can always get trailhead parking and if you are in a very popular location (think Old Faithful) you beat tour buses bearing masses.  If you visit the park this way, and you pack a lunch, you can generally explore on your own, eat lunch in a sunny, quiet location and then be back in your RV, tent, hotel room taking a nap while the early afternoon crowd idles in their cars waiting for parking places to open up.  The best part?  Once you wake up from your nap you can head back into the park before sunset.  You will sail through the park while everyone else is backed up trying to get out.  I know I sound more than a little smug on this topic but we did this in almost every park – and every time we beat the crowds.

• Visit the “friends of” sites before you visit.  Most of the National Parks have non-profit, non-government “booster” organizations.  Some of these organizations are small, some of them are impressive entities with serious funding.  All of them help augment park staff in some way.  They help underserved communities visit the park, they have special programming, and they engage in preservation work on many levels.   Think about them like the PTO, they do the stuff parks can’t always afford to do.  For example, the Yosemite Conservancy offers art classes in the park.  Their watercolor class involves a 2-mile hike led by an artist who teaches you how to capture elements of your hike in a watercolor sketch, fun!  Forever Yellowstone offers a Christmas backcountry adventure.  You spend several days in remote cabins snowshoeing during the day and listening to a naturalist by fireside in the evening.  Christmas Day is a potluck dinner.  My mom and Greg did this trip with friends several years ago and said it was one of the most memorable Christmas’ of their lives.  I am eying a trip for Christmas 2025 (Hazel will be 16, the trip’s minimum age) who wants to join!?!

The National Parks have taken on such meaning in our lives.  Not just because they were the backdrop for this trip but because they preserve the best of this country.  By and large, we don’t treat our planet well.  I am not sure what it will take for Earthlings to get our act together.  My hope is that we act sooner rather than later, and I think parks are part of the solution.  When our policy makers spend time in our parks, they make more educated policies.  When we spend time in our parks, I think we cast more educated votes.  The parks remind us of what we once had and can still preserve in this country.  The parks connect us to the Earth in a profound way, they remind us what matters.

If you haven’t been in a park lately, now is the time!  I would bet that the parks re-open on a limited basis this summer – what a great way to practice social distancing.  We are already dreaming about our next park visits.  Corona pre-empted a visit to the Florida parks.  Next up for us will be a family vacation to the Everglades.  We can’t wait.