bugsy running on lone rock beach with the airstream and f-150 in the background

Tag: national park

  • Death Valley National Park

    Death Valley National Park

    We visited Death Valley in December 2023, as part of our Tucson for Christmas trip. Death Valley is HUGE: it’s the largest US national park outside of Alaska, larger than Rhode Island and Delaware combined. It’s also the hottest, driest, and lowest national park, and the hottest place Earth, once hitting 134°F! (Beware of the heat if…

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  • Mammoth Cave National Park

    Mammoth Cave National Park

    We visited Mammoth Cave in December 2023 as part of our Tucson for Christmas trip. We couldn’t resist picking up another national park (our 40th!) while in the vicinity: From Knoxville, it was a pleasant 3.5-hour drive on smaller roads to Mammoth Cave National Park in south-central Kentucky. On a Monday in December, we had…

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  • New River Gorge National Park

    New River Gorge National Park

    This post combines activities in the New River Gorge from visits in September 2019, in May 2021, and in September 2023. The first time we visited Fayetteville, WV, in 2019, New River Gorge National Park wasn’t yet a national park! Previously designated a National River, the 70,000 acres surrounding the New River (actually one of the…

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  • Pinnacles National Park

    Pinnacles National Park

    We visited Pinnacles National Park for a few hours in mid-October 2022, as part of Big Trip #4. We thought Sequoia National Park was the last national park we’d be visiting in California, and then we looked at the route from our campground in Three Rivers (near Sequoia) to our next campground in Marina, on…

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  • Sequoia National Park

    Sequoia National Park

    We spent two nights outside Sequoia National Park in mid-October 2022, as part of Big Trip #4. In Yosemite, we met our first giant sequoias, from a distance. In Kings Canyon, we got up close and personal with lots more sequoias, including enormous stumps and logging graveyards. Our sequoia grand finale was Sequoia National Park!…

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  • Kings Canyon National Park

    Kings Canyon National Park

    We spent three days in Kings Canyon in early October 2022 as part of Big Trip #4. From Yosemite, we continued south to the next Northern California national park, Kings Canyon. Do you know anything about Kings Canyon? Because we didn’t until we started researching. Kings Canyon National Park and Sequoia National Park are adjacent…

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  • Yosemite National Park

    Yosemite National Park

    We spent three nights just outside Yosemite in early October 2022 as part of Big Trip #4. From Reno, it was a long (and expensive! gas prices in California!) 4.5-hour drive to our next campground near Yosemite National Park. Our route took us up Tioga Pass, the highest elevation highway pass in CA, and a…

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  • Lassen Volcanic National Park

    Lassen Volcanic National Park

    We spent two nights near Lassen Volcanic in early October 2022 as part of Big Trip #4. We had originally booked three nights for our Lassen Volcanic stop, but after being underwhelmed by our first hike, we decided to leave a day early. No offense, Lassen. It’s hard to compete with the other national parks…

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  • Crater Lake National Park

    Crater Lake National Park

    We visited Crater Lake in late September 2022 as part of Big Trip #4. Crater Lake National Park has been on my wishlist for a loooong time. It’s spectacularly gorgeous, but once you’ve done some hikes and stopped at the overlooks, you kind of get the idea. We’d planned on spending three nights there and…

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  • Mount Rainier National Park

    Mount Rainier National Park

    We visited Mt Rainier in late September 2022, as part of Big Trip #4. Mount Rainier National Park, the nation’s fifth national park, is centered around Mount Rainier, the tallest volcano (yes, volcano) in the Cascades, and the most glaciated mountain in the continental US. It’s a huge national park, and with five entrances, planning…

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