National Park Service Centennial

I am alive! Between being incredibly busy and having a total lack of motivation to write, I haven't posted anything in nearly 2 months. But here I am, and for a special day. Today, August 25, 2016, is the 100th birthday for the National Park Service! I just wanted to throw together a few photos highlighting the national parks I've been to, along with some suggestions of things to do at those parks and what have you. So, here we go!

Grand Canyon National Park, one of the quintessential national parks in the United States.

The National Park Service was established on August 25, 1916, by the National Park Service Organic Act as passed by Congress and then-president Woodrow Wilson. Actual national parks are older than 1916, however, with Yellowstone National Park (established in 1872) being the first national park in the United States. Several other national parks were then created, but each of the parks were individually managed. As the parks grew in number, Congress decided to establish an agency that would collectively oversee the parks, instead of leaving them to be individually managed.

The National Park Service doesn't only manage and oversee national parks; the agency also manages most national monuments, such as White Sands National Monument in New Mexico, which I've covered previously. In addition to National Monuments and National Parks, the agency manages several other types of locations such as National Historic Sites, National Battlefield Parks, National Parkways, National Recreation Areas, National Seashores, and other such properties.

As of now, I've personally visited 11 (of the 59) national parks and many other locations managed by the NPS. They all have their incredible beauties and differences, but I've never been to a single national park that left me underwhelmed. My personal favorite, so far at least, has been Petrified Forest National Park (which I've covered at this link) in Arizona. It was the first park I was able to visit west of the Mississippi River, and it was the first place that I really got a taste of "The American West."

Another personal favorite is Arches National Park. The juxtaposition between the beautifully sculpted red sandstone with the soaring La Sal Mountains in the background just makes for a mesmerizing place.

Zion Canyon in Zion National Park, Utah, as seen from atop Angels Landing.

This summer, while coming home from a field technician job in Southeast Arizona, I decided to take a 10 day road trip back to Ohio. I meandered up through Arizona, through southern Utah, through Colorado, and then back to Ohio via I-70. My plan was to hit as many national parks and other awesome natural areas as best I could for as cheaply as I could. In total I visited 5 national parks, and an assortment of national forests and other parks.

The Narrows Hike (Left), Angels Landing Hike (Right)

The two most memorable hikes from my roadtrip both came from Zion National Park in southwestern Utah. I did both the two most famous hikes at Zion: The Narrows and Angels Landing. The Narrows is a deep and narrow canyon which one can hike through. There is no "trail," and you just hike through the Virgin River. I opted to do 4 miles upstream and then 4 miles back downstream. The Angels Landing hike is a grueling climb up to the top of Angels Landing, a rock formation which rises 1,488 feet above the floor of Zion Canyon. The Angels Landing hike is infamous for the last 500 vertical feet in which you have to scramble up a steep sandstone face with over 1,000 foot drops on either side of the trail (which is sometimes only 2 or 3 feet wide). I'll hopefully be writing a post or two more on Zion in the near future!

Many National Parks, especially ones like Yellowstone, the Grand Canyon, and Yosemite, are known for being really busy, especially during the summer months. People visit these parks in droves because they are something special, but not every place the NPS manages is crowded and overflowing with people. In fact, if you're willing to sacrifice some comforts, you can easily escape the crowds. For example, try visiting busier parks in the winter, when attendance is drastically down. Another thing you can do is simply go off the beaten path. Take the photo above. This double arch is called Grosvenor Arch. It's in Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah. Grand Staircase-Escalante NM is a gigantic plot of land that lies between Grand Canyon, Zion, Bryce, Capitol Reef, and Canyonlands National Parks. It's an easy drive from any of those, yet has only a fraction of the visitors. This is mainly because it's wild. In this park you oftentimes have to take crazy dirt roads for miles to get to places without bathrooms or water or what have you. If you're comfortable with that and plan for the seclusion, you can often find yourself totally alone. I visited Grosvenor Arch over the summer, and there were about 5 people at the trailhead. To get there, you had to drive 20 miles one way down a dirt-rock-sand road, and even cross a creek. Not many people are willing to do that, and the touristy crowds disappear for those who are willing to.

Alpine tundra and spruce forest as seen from the Trail Ridge Road, Rocky Mountain National Park.

But it's still nice to be a tourist at a busy park. When I traveled to Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado, I visited the park on a Sunday afternoon. The crowds were insane, and the traffic was bumper to bumper, but the amazing views like the one above made it all worth it.

Cuyahoga Valley National Park in the Autumn.

Ohio even has its own national park! Although the vast majority of national parks are out west, Ohio is home to Cuyahoga Valley National Park, near Cleveland. Sadly, I've never properly explored the park, but many of those who live in the Cleveland area are very familiar with it! I've only visited for research, but hopefully sometime soon I can visit it for hiking!

The Great Smoky Mountains as seen from the Blue Ridge Parkway, North Carolina.

The national parks belong to you and I. They were created to protect amazing natural features for future generations to enjoy and visit. Sadly, there are many threats to the future of these treasures. Climate change is affecting all the aspects of all the national parks, from the wildlife to the plants to even the namesake features (For example, Glacier National Park is expected to lose all the namesake glaciers by 2050). On top of that, some politicians are currently trying to open up the national parks to activities such as mining and other horribly detrimental activities. And then there's the threat of invasive species, tourists damaging natural features while visiting, and a whole slew of other threats. These national parks should be protected for our children, their children, their children's children, and on and on and on. We have to take steps to ensure these lands are conserved and protected, because once they're gone, they're gone. It is our duty to do so.

Have you been to a national park? If so, which one is your favorite? Leave a comment below!

White Sands National Monument

Over a month ago I was making the trip from Ohio to southeastern Arizona for a field technician job. Along the way I passed right by White Sands National Monument in southern New Mexico. I knew visiting White Sands was an opportunity I couldn't pass up, so I took the exit and ventured into the park.

White Sands National Monument is a protected area of land over 143,000 acres in size. The main point of interest is the sprawling white sand dunes which stretch on for miles and miles. Located in south-central New Mexico, White Sands National Monument attracts nearly 600,000 visitors a year. The area was designated a national monument back in 1933 by then-president Herbert Hoover. Many people (including myself) will often erroneously refer to White Sands as a national park, but national monuments in the US are a bit different from national parks. National parks in the US essentially protect natural scenic areas which are of national or international significance. National monuments, on the other hand, aim to preserve a single significant feature (more or less), and this feature can be culturally, historically, or naturally significant. There's also some bureaucratic differences; Congress will establish new national parks, while the president will proclaim national monuments.

How exactly did these sand dunes form? First, as always, you have to look at the greater geologic setting. White Sands sits in the Tularosa Basin (outlined in blue above). This entire area of New Mexico belongs to the basin and range province of the US. As the name suggests, the basin and range province is made up of basins and (mountain) ranges. These basins and ranges formed (in short) due to extensional tectonic forces millions of years ago. As the land was pulled apart, large faults formed that broke the land into blocks. Some of these blocks slid upward and became mountain ranges. Other blocks slid downward and became basins. Erosion than began acting on the new mountains, and sediment began to flow down the slopes before being deposited in the low-lying basins. This resulted in the basins becoming extensive flat plains that we now see in between the various mountain ranges in this geologic region. In this specific area, White Sands sits in the Tularosa Basin, surrounded on either side by the San Andres Mountains and the Sacramento Mountains.

Now that we've set the scene, let's dive into the actual geologic history of the sand dunes. About 280 million years ago (the Permian Period) what is now the southwest US was covered in a shallow sea. This shallow sea deposited various layers of sediment which then became the bedrock of the area presently. Some of these layers were made up of gypsum, or calcium sulfate dihydrate. When the geologic forces creating the basins and ranges of the area occurred, sections of these gypsum layers were thrust upward with the forming mountains and subsequently became exposed. If you look at the photo above, you can see the whitish layers of gypsum in the mountains. Gypsum dissolves in water and is therefore easily erodible. As a result, rainwater and wind has been slowly eroding these gypsum layers. Rainwater with the dissolved gypsum would run down the mountains and into the basin below. Normally it would be carried to the ocean, but the water carried into the Tularosa Basin is contained and has no way out. This closed-off factor is very crucial to the formation of the sand dunes.

During the Wisconsin Glacial Period about 24,000 to 12,000 years ago, the southwest was a much wetter place. Gypsum-rich rainwater would run into the Tularosa Basin and into a large lake called Lake Otero. This lake was at the base of the San Andres Mountains. As the glacial period ended, the climate in this region became drier and drier. Lake Otero began to dry up, and the dissolved gypsum precipitated out and was deposited in the form of selenite crystals along the now-dry lake bed.

Around 10,000 years ago, strong prevailing winds began blowing from the southwest to the northeast. These winds began to erode the deposited selenite in the old lake bed, forming white gypsum sand. This sand was then picked up by the wind and blown inches by inches toward the northeast. As this happened, the sand began building up. Over the course of the next several thousand years, the sand accumulated into massive sand dunes. These sand dunes are still forming today. During instances of heavy rain, rainwater dissolves more gypsum in the San Andres Mountains. This rainwater runs into an ephemeral lake (called a playa) known as Lake Lucero, which is a smaller lake bed that sits in the old site of Lake Otero. This water will evaporate, leaving behind gypsum deposits, and the wind will create more gypsum sand. Although this process is occurring every year, the bulk of the dune formation occurred due to erosion of the Lake Otero deposits.

These beautiful white sand dunes are an ever-changing feature of the Tularosa Basin. Wind is constantly changing the shapes of the dunes, and they slowly morph and move over the basin. It's a very dynamic park, and well worth the visit. When I visited, the wind was really blowing. You could see the tiny sand grains moving over the tops of the dunes. When you're sitting on top of a dune, you can really feel the lively nature of the system.

Thanks for reading!