Hiking

Bryce Canyon National Park

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This view is of Bryce Amphitheater from Bryce Point in the morning. Below are the 5.5 mile Peekaboo Loop, 1.3 mile Navajo Loop, 1.8 mile Queens Garden and other trails through the hoodoos. Definitely do at least one hike, if you’re able at this altitude, or even better, book a trail ride from the lodge. I won’t ever forget the spectacular feeling of riding through a layered maze of brightly colored hoodoos with my family; it is one of the best park experiences I have ever enjoyed.

There are around 15 different trails and as many overlooks, including Mossy Cave, Natural Bridge, Rainbow Point and Fairyland Point. Carbon burners should stay home or at least park and take the free shuttle, which goes from the hotels and campground near the entrance to the lodge and the most popular viewpoints and trailheads, but, since the shuttle is not yet electric, I drove my EV around early.

Bryce Canyon is between 7,500’ and 8,500’, and it is one of the prettiest places to appreciate geology. Long story short, the inland sea dried up, the land rose and erosion created the hoodoos and the rest of the canyons in the area. Grand Canyon is the bottom of the grand staircase, Zion in the middle and Bryce near the top. The colors of the steps span from ancient dark rock, tans, chocolate, vermillion, marble, to pink and white. And, if that’s not enough, it’s easy to see mule deer and other wildlife, wildflowers and to appreciate the dark night sky.

This is a great park to visit in April. Here’s the link to my visits to all parks in Utah.

Mesa Verde National Park

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This is Balcony House, which requires a reserved ticket, climbing cliff-side ladders and crawling though a short tunnel. It’s worth it. The dwelling is named for the intact, original balcony on the right side of the photo under two upper story windows. At other cliff dwellings across the southwest, typically only the beams remain, like those on the wall to the far left. This dwelling is also unusual for facing northeast, lacking fires in this section, and for the large flat floor with a low wall at the edge of the cliff. This place was used for important gatherings, but not in winter.

Mesa Verde is a huge, green high plateau, so start at Park Point Overlook, where you can see from Colorado’s snow-capped peaks to Shiprock, which I first saw after visiting Canyon de Chelly. From up here, you get a sense of the region as one greater community of interrelated tribes, trading and interacting with one another frequently, and not four separate arbitrarily bounded states.

This is my favorite park for cliff dwellings, so see as many as you can. The Cliff Palace is the largest in North America (reserve a ticket), and while you only walk along the bottom edge, you do get close enough to appreciate its extent and architecture. Spruce Tree House is only visible from an overlook, Long House was booked, and Step House was perfect to visit on my own first thing in the morning. The ranger talks are extremely informative, even after visiting many other Native American sites.

Finally, slow down here. The mesa has basically no Wi-Fi or cell signal (save a photo of your tickets). There are bus loads of tourists, so the few places to eat are crowded (Metate needs reservations). The Far View Lodge rooms don’t have TV, and it can be a peaceful place, if you try. My laptop finally stopped working, so I ended up sitting outside, saw a rabbit and thought long enough to reconsider my past and future. This World Heritage Site has already seen more recent devastating wildfires than they have cliff dwelling sites open to visit, so these moments in places like this are rare and diminishing rapidly.

Here’s the link to my visits to all parks in Colorado.

Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park

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This view is looking downstream from Sunset View overlook, but the upstream view is blacker, steeper and narrower. The canyon there is over twice as deep (2250’) as it is wide at the top. The Sawatch Range, Elk Mountains and San Juan Mountains all feed into the canyon in spring. There are half a dozen good overlooks on the South Rim to peer down into the canyon, and some cause vertigo, as the cliffs are near vertical drops from the rim. The North Rim is a 2 hour remote drive, has fewer overlooks, a campground and horseback riding.

The South Rim has a campground and a visitor center, and is only steps from Gunnison Point, which may have the best view down into the canyon, although my photography skills were insufficient. The short hiking trails along the rim, down into the canyon (a little) and to the high point to the left above each provide a different view into the geologic depths.

The East Portal campground is technically in Curecanti NRA and is accessed by a steep road down to the Gunnison River (barely visible above) near the upstream dam. I’ll have to come back. Since I arrived here in October, there was already snow falling in the mountain pass on 50 to the east. The road was also being repaired after some fearsome rockslides. On the plus side, the drive through the mountains included bright fall foliage that contrasted with the black rocks. Montrose makes a convenient spot to charge, and it has two well-reviewed Himalayan restaurants.

North northeast of the park, the river flows through Gunnison Gorge, a large wilderness and conservation area. So the park’s unwieldy name distinguishes the Black Canyon area from the less visited Gunnison Gorge area, though it’s all one contiguous rough landscape carved through by the Gunnison River.

Here’s the link to my visits to all parks in Colorado.

Dinosaur National Monument

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The Quarry Exhibit Hall, near Jensen Utah, has a crazy collection of large, late Jurassic dinosaur bones set in a two story high, very wide quarry wall, and you can touch them. It’s awesome. The Allosaurus skull above, a raptor talon-claw, Apatosaurus leg bones, and many Camarasaurus bones including a skull still set high in the quarry wall are all fascinating. This dinosaur exhibit is at the east end of the park after the Green River comes out of Split Mountain Canyon, and there’s a nice view, petroglyphs & pictograms.

Up the Green River is the extremely deep Canyon of Lodore, explored by John Wesley Powell, accessed from the north via permitted river trips or visible after a hike from the Gates of Lodore campground. There’s a conservation area north of the park in Utah named after Powell. Colorado’s Yampa River joins the Green from the east near Harper’s Corner, which has “the best view in the park” at the end of a hike and a 48 mile round trip drive. Unfortunately, I did not plan my charging to include either of those sections, so maybe next time.

There aren’t many good Tesla chargers around Dinosaur. Not sure why, but I noticed that some of the surrounding towns still support coal, have Halliburton operations, and have unfortunately unstable, irrational, fossil-fuel supporting representation in Congress. There’s a welcome center in Dinosaur Colorado with EV charging, but I don’t (yet) have the right kind of “combined charging system” CCS adapter. Since I’m in a hurry trying to visit high altitude parks during a short timeframe, I made due with a couple of 3rd party chargers I found using the PlugShare app, rather than stay in state park campgrounds. Especially when you get unexpected roadwork detours, being able to tap into other chargers is helpful.

Here’s the link to my visits to all parks in Utah.

Great Basin National Park

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First, if you can’t get a reservation in time to visit Lehman Caves, just visit the park anyway. I took the virtual cave tour, and, I suspect that Timpanogos in Utah is better and less damaged. Besides, the park isn’t a cave park, it’s the highlight of the Great Basin area, which includes most of Nevada, western Utah and parts of three other states, and has a glacial basin of its own at the top of a 13,500 foot mountain.

Second, stop at Mather Overlook to admire the views and fall foliage of yellow and orange Aspen amid the dark green conifers. There’s a bronze model there that shows the structure of the basin, which is helpful orientation, since it is a long winding road.

Third, understand that the glacier here, “the only glacier in Nevada”, is gone. In theory, there might be some subterranean ice under some of the rocks for another couple years, but climate change has wiped this glacier off the face of the earth. The park maps showing a “rock glacier” in white are out of date. Any snow you see up there is seasonal.

Fourth, take the Glacier Trail anyway, since it goes through the Bristlecone Pine grove and up into the basin. If you only get as far as the grove (2.8 miles roundtrip), that’s what I felt was the highlight of the park. The other two Bristlecone Pine groves are in very remote areas of the park. There are also some trails to pretty alpine lakes, but be careful, as many of the hikes are over 10,000 feet. Spending the night at altitude can help, as well as give you lovely views of the Milky Way.

Finally, this is my favorite park for old trees. The Bristlecone Pine, far from merely eking out a bleak minimal survival, is a gold resinous Adonis, shining in the bright Alpine sun, with luxurious thickly packed bright green bristles. We don’t know how long they can live. One that was removed from here in 1964 was over 4,900 years old. Unfortunately, climate change will likely make them extinct, as other trees will grow at higher elevations, crowding them and subjecting them to more wildfire damage.

Here’s the link to my visits to all parks in Nevada.

Devils Postpile National Monument

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The park is only accessible for zero carbon travel for a few weeks after the required shuttle service ends (mid September) and before the road closes (early to mid October). Shuttle buses are useful for reducing carbon pollution, but unless they’re sustainably fueled, they’re out of bounds to me. Red’s Meadow Cafe was still open, but the resort was closed when I arrived late September.

Since both the John Muir and Pacific Crest Trails run together through the park, I recommend you hike in a loop around the base of the broken basalt columns, across one of the two bridges across the Middle Fork of the San Joaquin River, along the combined JMT & PCT trail ridge where I got the photo, and back across the other bridge. There are also pretty waterfalls at both the north and especially south ends of the monument, but be careful hiking as the park is at around 7,500 feet in altitude up near the Mammoth Mountain ski area. There’s also a trail up through the trees to the top of the columns, which were formed 80,000 years ago when a diabolically molten lake cooled and cracked deeply in hexagonal and similar shapes and which were revealed by glaciation 15,000 years ago. Enjoy!

Here’s the link to my visits to all parks in California.

Effigy Mounds National Monument

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On the Iowa side of the Mississippi River looking across from the high bluffs toward Wisconsin, there are over 200 hundred mounds, round, linear, bird and bear shaped. They are in clear lines straight out from the river, and they date back roughly 1,000 years, evidence of cultural traditions that continued for hundreds of years. Although these sites typically do not make the connection, there are similar sites along the Mississippi and other rivers at overlapping time periods with evidence of trade between them. Bird symbols in particular are found in both modern and ancient Native American culture. Many similar mounds were flattened and plowed under after the land was stolen.

The hiking here is excellent, with many overlooks, including Fire Point above and Third View which looks upriver. The hillock to the right of the path is one of the mounds, first in a long line into the woods. A pair of hawks soared high above. If you can make it a few miles, your chances of seeing deer and other wildlife improve. Since it is a sacred site, please stay on the trails and do not walk over the mounds.

Here’s the link to my visits to all parks in Iowa.

Harpers Ferry National Historical Park

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Since each park is unique, I would never be able to say which is my favorite. But this one is.

Here, at the confluence of the Shenandoah and Potomac Rivers, in 1859 the abolitionist John Brown led 18 men to capture the armory, arsenal, and rifle factory here, killing three men, freeing slaves and taking the town’s leaders captive, before being captured by Col. Robert E. Lee and martyred after a brief trial, becoming the first person executed for treason in America. Brown believed he was right, did not intend for anyone to die and argued at trial that “had I interfered on behalf of the rich, the powerful… or any of that class… this court would have deemed it an act worthy of reward.”

Native Americans lost this land to European settlers during the 16th and 17th centuries. Washington explored the area for his canal project and recommended an armory be built here. The armory supplied Lewis & Clark‘s expedition, and the arsenal supplied weapons for the Civil War. During which the town changed hands eight times including the destruction of the arsenal, the capture of 12,500 Union soldiers by Stonewall Jackson and the critical resistance to the confederate army marching on DC. Major Delaney, the only African American field officer in that war, came from here, alongside many USCT recruits. Frederick Douglass and W.E.B. DuBois organized and lectured here, where the Freedman’s School and Storer College educated the descendants of slaves.

Thomas Jefferson stood on a rocky overlook and said “this scene is worth a voyage across the Atlantic.” The mountains, rocky cliffs, rivers, swamps, and floodplains here support diverse wildlife, including three species of hawk, a harrier and the bald eagle. There are over 20 miles of hiking trails in the park, including part of the Appalachian Trail (park & hike). And the tavern in town serves a draft amber ale called Almost Heaven.

“Almost heaven, West Virginia
Blue Ridge Mountains, Shenandoah River”

John Denver

Here’s the link to my visits to all parks in West Virginia, to Abolition & Equal Education parks, to African American history parks and to Civil War parks nationally.

Appalachian National Scenic Trail

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It was hiking on the trail in New England as a boy that I got the idea to visit as many national parks as I could. Some of the counselors were discussing their trail names and talking about the best natural places to visit in the country. I never forgot that feeling of walking deep into nature, exploring, seeing wildlife, jumping into a swimming hole and imagining traveling to even more beautiful places. It took a long time, but I’m finally fulfilling part of that dream.

I don’t know if I have it in me anymore to hike the whole trail, but I would love to try. The relief map (above) in the park-partner Appalachian Trail Conservancy visitor center in Harpers Ferry gives you a sense of both the distance and the many mountains that must be summited. But I wasn’t about to take a gas-polluting bus to get from the Harpers Ferry visitor center parking lot into town, especially when I could walk a couple miles of the AT to get there. And I would recommend hiking the trail, even just a small section, if you can. For the adventurous, the expert suggested thru-hiking the trail in two sections, from Harper’s Ferry in the spring north to Katahdin in Maine and then from Harper’s Ferry south to Springer in Georgia in the fall.

Below, I’ve listed the units either on or next to the trail.

Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park

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The highlight of the canal has to be the tavern, lock and boat in Maryland across from the Great Falls Park in Virginia. It’s only a short walk here to a view of the falls from the ecologically important Olmsted Island, which was preserved by the son of the famous landscape architect. There are limited boat rides on Saturdays until mid October. Williamsport has a much more elaborate and functioning canal boat exhibit, but their rides are currently suspended. If time allows, I would like to come back next year to bike along the multi-state canal route.

Here’s the link to my visits to all parks in Maryland.