Our national park system is a treasure for both the residents of this country and guests from around the world. The reason Hooniverse has been quiet the last few days is because I’ve been on a short vacation to Yosemite. Never having been before, I was overwhelmed by the scale of it all. My wife, daughter, and I stayed in Half Dome Village in a cabin nestled near the base of a seemingly sheer cliff that hides Glacier Point somewhere closer to the sun.
I’m going to write about the trip, and the car that brought us there and back. It was an Audi S5 Sportback. But that’s not what this post is about.
http://hooniverse.info/2011/10/13/xplore-fj-cruiser-explore-our-country-bring-a-gas-card/
Instead, I want to hear about your favorite parks. What is your favorite national park? Did you have a memorable trip to one of the parks? Let us know by sounding off in the comments below.
Hooniverse Asks: What's your favorite national park?
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44 responses to “Hooniverse Asks: What's your favorite national park?”
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Went to Yellowstone in the winter back in 2005. Got to indulge in several motorized activities. First up, we got a Subaru Outback Sport rental car. I was able to indulge in a few WRC fantasies on the drive from Mammoth Hot Springs to Cooke City. Then we got to tour about half the park on snowmobiles. I had ridden snowmobiles a few times in Colorado, my wife never had ridden one. It took her several miles to get up the courage to go fast enough to keep up with the tour group. If you have never ridden a snowmobile, it could best be described as a combination of a ATV and a Waverunner/PWC. Also, after over 100 miles in one day on one, you can barely walk! We saw most of the rest of the park via snow coach. A snow coach can best be described as a combination of a 14 passenger Van and a APC, at least the one we rode in. The old school ones were little 8 passenger things with a Chevy V-8 hung on the back. https://bangshift.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/van2.jpg
The wildlife and scenery were absolutely amazing. In the winter most of the wildlife sticks to the roads, most roads are just groomed snow for the winter with the exception of the road from Mammoth Hot Springs to Cooke City. My in-laws went last summer and complained of seeing little wildlife. We were delayed 2 hours on our snowcoach tour by a heard of bison.
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That van is AMAZING
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Blue one or yellow one? The yellow one is the rear engine old school SBC. A Google search shows that it looks like they have mostly switched over to Matraxs now. When I was there only the park ranger SUVs had those.
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Both – both are amazing
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Is that a spare tire hung on the front of the yellow one?
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Technically, spare road wheel.
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Aha!
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We went to Mammoth Hot Springs over New Years, the snowcoaches looked like this. The snow wasn’t deep this year, don’t know if they switch over to tracks when it’s deeper. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/61dbe59a64f2d65a4b996e69c8c1f9cd67e07af75fae53e4877b9f09a72a8502.jpg
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Probably just the new style. They groom all the roads in the winter so it should be about the same. I imagine that it is much cheaper to just do a lift kit with big wheels and tires than the whole track conversion.
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That thing is awesome! We were there in the summer, though, and all I saw were these.
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Those are special. Glacier has several – a buddy of mine spent a summer driving one. Said they were pigs and wondered allowed if the dent he put in his is still there.
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I wonder if they have added some insulation to the canvas roofs?
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Some of my favorite US National parks are actually National Monuments (like White Sands, Dinosaur, Canyon De Chelly). I will be visiting great Sand Dunes National Park this October. But my current favorites that I’ve been to are Joshua Tree, Saguaro and Arches (Moab). All this might go out the window if and when I get to Canyonlands.
Some of my favorite US National parks are actually National Monuments (like White Sands, Dinosaur, Canyon De Chelly). I will be visiting great Sand Dunes National Park this October. But my current favorites that I’ve been to are Joshua Tree, Saguaro and Arches (Moab). All this might go out the window if and when I get to Canyonlands. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ac30c82021c592dfbbf7907aebf6059b8b0a25c7edb15133c7b5f86bd54d9404.jpg
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Great sand dunes is the only one I like, they are the only one that allows dogs:) sorry no dogs, no like!
Phew, I thought the ‘Verse had crashed – or worse. That was a tough few days to make us sweat through.
As far as parks – so, so many that it’s hard to pick just one. But, being a complete and total ‘flat-lander’ here, I think my absolute favorite is Black Canyon of the Gunnison in Colorado. The crazy steep drive down into the canyon, the trout fishing, the landscape, and the best part (for this hermit) is that it isn’t over run with other tourists.
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Sorry about that – I hadn’t scheduled any posts in advance, so it’s my fault for the lack of content… When you’re in an area of the country as beautiful as Yosemite (with spotty Internet to boot) you start to worry a bit less about that stuff.
Still, I should’ve had a few things ready to go. -
I can relate to the flatlander in the mountains part. I must have added half an hour to my hike to Mt Kosciuszko by taking photos – I figured it would be a while before I was back there. Nearly 13.5 years ago now!
The question is relevant to my interests, as one of my wife’s life ambitions is to visit every one of them. However, it’s hard pick a single favorite. Yellowstone in winter, Smokies in fall, Glacier anytime. Crater Lake is fantastic – if you go, the boat ride is a must and make the most of your time on the island. I’m personally in awe of the Redwoods. We enjoyed the Grand Canyon but preferred the rest of the parks in the grand staircase.
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Visiting every one is our ambition too, though I consider Alaska a separate and unique challenge. Saying a favorite park is like picking a favorite child. I like talking about a favorite experience in a park or overlooked parks, though partly to show off how many I’ve been to. Where I haven’t been is anywhere on the west coast. Thank you for mentioning the boat ride, that is going on the to do list.
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Alaska and the east coast are our blind spots. I’m a little less keen on east than west, because the latter parks are so majestic. It must be done, though, there are so few in the west that we haven’t yet hit.
Get your reservation well in advance for the boat – space is limited. IIRC, we extended our stay for a day to get spots.
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Lots of redwoods on the CA coast too.
Do places like Alcatraz and Hearst Castle count as National Parks?-
Alcatraz and Hearst Castle are not National Parks, although the former is operated by the National Park Service. U.S. has a lot of different designations for places of interest.
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Reasonable with a blooger vacation! I changed and spend my life chasing mountain views (and the gravel roads that come with them). Beauty contests are hard, but I’d have to say Jotunheimen for my corner of the world. Rugged, icy mountain tops, which could just as well be on the moon…count me in. The Icefields Parkway and its surroundings in Canada are absolutely fantastic, too.
The most overwhelming landscape I have seen myself though is the Lofoten. 900 meter high mountains growing right out of the sea, no people on the East side, lots of wildlife, wonderful Arctic sea climate…hard to beat.
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Does Noway count as national park?
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Never been to Norway – it’s on the list, my wife’s family hails from Foldøy. I’m with you on the Icefields Parkway, though. We spent our honemoon tenting Banff and Jasper in October. It was magnificent.
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How is that in October? Snowing already? I was there fairly early in the season and even snuck into a camp area that usually requires pre-ordering a spot two years in advance (forgot the name; showed up and got lucky). I only had a week and got a bit spooked by my relative’s wildlife stories, but more time there is on my bucket list. Foldøy is only a few hours from me. 🙂
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There were a few flurries when we were there but nothing on the ground. The big excitement was the elk rut. They are aggressive when horny, we wisely kept our distance.
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When I was there ten years ago, I rented a Ford Fivehundred. Very vanilla in every imaginable way, but it did go up as well as down. I intended to do a hike somewhere else on my way back to Vancouver from Edmonton, but a mud slide had blocked the road so I got to see it all again.
I was very impressed with the road building standard in Canada: Wide, well-curved, well-paved roads. Sometimes, you’d encounter outsized warning signs about bad road standards…these roads were still twice as good as Norwegian mountain roads.
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I’d have to say Glacier. After my freshman year in college, I worked at the Many Glacier Hotel in the summer of 1973. A terrific experience and magnificent vistas everywhere. Don’t get me started on stories – I could go all night… https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/2ffa1c770fc21f9ecc40eadb5c3ba18db8d2f9e7c18952391bfc07c8ef5953e7.jpg
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I did notice at Yellowstone, with the exception of the Park Rangers, all the service staff were either college aged or retirement age.
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Same at Yosemite
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Am I alone willing to set aside a night now…? I’ve worked in several similar places and what I love the most about it is its otherworldly feel. You get the news and all these tourists landing on your planet, but those earthly troubles they bring with them just don’t stick.
We’re trying to hit as many as possible before the kids leave the house. We just visited Olympic and Crater Lake this summer, and in recent years have gone to Grand Canyon and Yellowstone. On our short to-do list are Glacier, Yosemite, and Acadia, and I’d also really like to cross the border and visit Banff.
So far, though, I think my favorite was Grand Teton. It was low-key, but beautifully peaceful.
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1860/42541649820_edb97c1a20_k.jpg
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co-sign Grand Teton. amazing vista. bonus: the name means Big Nipple.
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I did Banff with my wife and in-laws a couple years back, in May – the scenery is great, but that was also a decent time since all the wildlife was active having just come out of hibernation.
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We were actually staying out of Calgary (in town for a wedding) – the 90 min drive in wasn’t so bad, although we should have bought our park pass online. Got up to the Icefield as well, although we didn’t actually do the tour.
My wife also wants to see Yoho (Banff, on the other side of the BC/AB border for non-Canadians) – I don’t know if that would be any quieter.
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Several years ago I did a trip through several of the NP’s mentioned, and I would ask is there a bad National Park? The east entry to Zion-Mt Carmel NP with the tunnels is pretty special, the Old Faithful geyser is worth seeing, the Grand Canyon has a lot to offer.
In Australia, the Kosciuszko NP is a year-round park, snow in winter and high country landscape and the hydro power dams (one power station has tours) in summer. They run one of the ski lifts year-round for easier access to Mt Kosciuszko (highest point in Aus).
The Blue Mountains NP just out of Sydney has some good stuff, some parts are reminiscent of a smaller Grand Canyon. The Flinders Ranges in South Australia has some wildly-varying geology that is visible and the Wilpena Pound meteorite crater. If the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park counts that is pretty impressive too.
Kakadu in the Northern Territory doesn’t need much introduction I think? I did a day trip there in the wet season and short of the ocean I don’t think I’ve seen so much water – 80-90% of the land from horizon to horizon was under water in the Alligator River area. The point where the boat tour leaves in the dry season was 10 feet under water. As part of the trip was a short flight along the edge of the escarpment, with countless waterfalls fed by the daily thunderstorms. The weather was 90F+, 90%+ humidity most of the time.
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The whole stretch from Broome to Darwin is pretty magical.
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I haven’t been out that way myself, but – one day!
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Well, this is a state park rather than national (though it does border a national forest and a national monument), but I’m gonna say Custer State Park in western South Dakota. It has a bunch of fantastic hiking trails, lovely lakes and waterways, breathtaking views, tons of wildlife, and great history.
Oh, it’s also home to one of the greatest driving roads one will find in the country, the Peter Norbeck Scenic byway. It covers nearly 70 miles featuring several switchbacks, pigtail curves, and tunnels blasted out the granite outcroppings.
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There are soooo many good ones. I recently went to Pinnacles National Park, in California which is the newest park, amazing place. Favorite national park is Badlands though! Close runner-ups include Capitol Reef in Utah, Rocky Mountain, and Wind Cave.
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