National Parked Site Information

The idea for it was first come up with in mid 2006, and actual development started in late 2006. Over 150 days were spent in the parks between September of 2006 and October of 2007 gathering information and photos for the site. The site officially opened on January 1, 2008.

This site is intended to serve all facets of a national park vacation. Its information is here to help plan every part of the trip. However, it is also meant to be a hub for memories and interaction AFTER the trip. Any registered user may participate in the discussions on our forums. In this way you can share with others the excitement of a trip to America's best places.

Yes. We intend to provide all of the information and interactive features free of charge. However, the cost to host, maintain and improve the site with future visits is considerable. To offset this, we have relationships with hotel chains, Travelocity, and Amazon. By clicking through this site when you need these services, you help to ensure this site's survival, and it never adds anything to your cost.

Each park generally has each of the sections listed below. However, there are many exceptions. For example, there are no roads in Lake Clark National Park, so that section is missing. Likewise, there are no campgrounds in some parks, such as Carlsbad Caverns National Park, so the camping section is absent. Also, some parks will have additional sections, such as Yellowstone National Park, which has an extensive section on the thermal areas.

The Fast Facts section is the home, or index page, of each park listing. It is headed by a map displaying the park's location. It is followed by a chart with basic facts. The "Creation Date" is the time the park was either authorized or created. This can vary somewhat from source to source, but we take the dates from the National Park Service's official timeline. Annual visitation shows the last full year's official total, followed by a link to view all-time statistics. The rest are self-explanatory. Then listed are some of the nearest points of interest to the park. Next comes official address and contact phone numbers for the park. There is also a list of major steps in the park's evolution, finally followed by a short section on the animals and plants of the park.

This section lists all formal campgrounds in the park. The large majority are operated by the National Park Service; it is noted in the listing if they are private and/or operated by park concessioners. Images of each campground are provided when we have personally been there to obtain them. Third party images are never used on this site.

This section lists first any official in-park lodging provided by concessioners. After this are specific hotel listings, complete with links to directly to the property. We include distances to park entrance and directions via Google for all listings. All of the chain hotels guarantee this link to have the lowest rates available online. We only list hotels that have online booking functionality, as this is generally the cheapest and easiest way.

This section starts with quick general directions to the park from various major points. It goes on to list the nearest airports. At the bottom of the page are links to the original park map, both in their original Adobe Acrobat PDF files, and an easy to use, and generally smaller, JPEG conversion.

This section is one of our favorites. It starts with a map of the park, with the sections we cover in-depth highlighted. On the pages beyond are meticulous mile-by-mile logs of the roads, complete with images and descriptions. Note that odometers can actually vary quite significantly from one car to another, so the numbers may not match your travels exactly, but they certainly give you a good idea of the road layout, as well as distances between certain points.

This section simply provides a list of some of the more popular hikes in the park, complete with distances, difficulties, and locations. A description is given as well, and images(s) are normally provided for all hikes we have undertaken ourselves.

The Photo Gallery link leads to the section of our Photo Gallery for the park in question. These images are produced exclusively by us.

Park books, maps, and DVDs are presented in the form of a sophisticated Amazon storefront. "Books and Maps" includes hand selected guide books, hiking guides, maps, and other relevant literature. "DVDs" leads to hand selected DVDs dealing with the park in question. This saves you from searching the labyrinth of Amazon's millions of items, and shows you the most relevant books and other media for the park. We personally own and use many of these items. "Photo Prints & Items" leads to a gallery of our photos that are available as prints in a variety of sizes, as well as on various things such as shirts, mugs, and puzzles. Note that not every park has all of these media types available, so some or all of these sections may be missing from the park listing.