He Knew He Was Right

Today marks the centennial of the National Park Service, and I'm not ashamed to admit that I've looked forward to this day all year. As a rather big fan of the NPS, I've visited about 20 new sites this year, some big and many smaller ones. I learned or greatly enjoyed something at every single location. Since I have posted a few other lists here, I thought it might be interesting to do the same for the parks I've visited to date: Alphabetically by state, here goes... Denali NP AK Kenai Fjords NP AK Fort Smith NHS AR Hot Springs NP AR Pea Ridge NMP AR Grand Canyon NP AZ Lake Mead NRA AZ Petrified Forest NP AZ Death Valley NP CA Golden Gate NRA CA Lassen Volcanic NP CA Lava Beds NM CA Redwood Forest NP CA San Francisco Maritime NHP CA Whiskeytown NRP CA Yosemite NP CA Colorado NM CO Mesa Verde NP CO Roc...

I first saw it in one of the U.S. National Parks of the Rockies--Glacier, I think, but certainly by the time I reached Yellowstone or the Grand Tetons. It was there that I noticed a few hikers gathered around a National Parks Passport cancellation station. It was 1992, and I was really just getting started with my National Parks obsession. To that point, my visits to any of the places in the National Park System were limited: I had been to Gettysburg and Cape Hatteras when I was younger, I had driven to Mount Rushmore and the Badlands the year before, I toured Civil War battlefields early in 1992 and my Dad and I drove to Acadia earlier in August. That two-week gem, which started in the last week of the month, was my first National Parks focused trip and one of my all-time favorite travel adventures. I drove a large loop that led me first to Rocky Mountain National Park and then north to Little Bighorn Battlefield, before kicking into high gear with stops from Glacier National Park d...