11 great, lesserknown parks
Avoid the crowds and traffic of Yellowstone or the Grand Canyon
The glories of the national park system draw hundreds of millions of visitors each year, even in normal times.
But in this upside-down year, with the pandemic still limiting much travel in and outside the United States, it’s likely that the National Park Service’s 419 sites, 62 with a “national park” designation, will attract even more people looking to get away.
For potential park-goers who wish to avoid these crowds (and this season, who doesn’t?), one strategy is to skip the Grand Canyon, the Great Smoky Mountains and the other top 10 parks that typically receive the majority of visitors. There are alternatives that are still awe-inspiring for your summer and fall fresh-air retreats, ones that offer many of the Top Ten’s sights, sounds, wildlife and activities.
You may need to drive, either for safety or a lack of transit options, but these lesser-known crown jewels, all off the beaten path, are almost always mercifully free of the large groups and car traffic found in the more popular parks.
Wherever you decide to go, remember that this is a new world. As the majority of on-site visitor centers will remain closed, contacting the parks before your trip for up-to-date information and any necessary permits is highly recommended.
South Carolina Congaree
Instead of Great Smoky Mountains
Congaree, a park named after the original Native American inhabitants, was created in central South Carolina to preserve 15 species of trees that are the tallest such specimens anywhere. These includes the most statuesque loblolly pine in the world, towering 167 feet above the surrounding tupelo forest. Tree lovers know Congaree, with only 159,445 visitors last year, as the Redwoods of the East — this year it’s worth forgetting about nearby Great Smoky Mountains and its 12 million-plus visitors.
Congaree reopened some of its hiking and paddling trails for day use on May 28, but the visitor center will remain closed until further notice. It’s best to experience this floodplain park — locals will bristle if you call it a
swamp — on the water, paddling several canoe trails or fishing for yellow perch or bass on its lakes. When the park offerings increase in its second phase of reopening, consider an overnight Congaree River paddle trip.
Congaree National Park, Hopkins, S.C., 803-776-4396
Minnesota Voyageurs National Park
Instead of Glacier Bay
If you haven’t seen the northern lights, never mind Alaska. Instead, grab a camera and a paddle and head to Voyageurs National Park, named after the French Canadian canoeists who plied these waters three centuries ago. This park of lakes is 40% water and adjoins another 10,000 square miles of aquatic wilderness. Its remoteness, flanking the Canadian border in northern Minnesota, enables incredible stargazing opportunities all year long and an estimated 200 nights of northern lights (even in summer).
While the 341-square-mile park reopened in mid May, its three visitor centers are likely to remain closed all summer. However, houseboat and canoe rentals are available online, along with permits for camping among the park’s hundreds of islands. Most visitors, less than a quarter million per year, come to fish the more than 50 finned species, play on the water or listen to loons yodeling across the mirrored waters.
Voyageurs National Park, International Falls, Minn., 218283-6600
Colorado Great Sand Dunes or Black Canyon
Instead of Rocky Mountain Park
Great Sand Dunes National Park & Preserve features the highest dunes on the continent, towering 755 feet above the surrounding trails. These are set in an otherworldly catchment basin, below the 14,000-foot high Sangre de Cristo Mountains, some 200 miles south of Denver. All trails and most of the campgrounds are open, along with overnight backcountry access, but the visitor center is closed.
Sand boarding and fat-tire mountain biking are popular on and among the dunes, as is horseback riding on surrounding trails. If you want another sight, Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park is 195 miles west, and features a spectacular half-miledeep river gorge that recently reopened for day use. Both parks average less than a half-million visitors per year, one tenth the traffic of Rocky Mountain National Park.
Great Sand Dunes National Park, Mosca, 719-378-6395
Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, Gunnison, 970641-2337 ext. 205
Texas Big Bend
Instead of a trip to Mexico This park in west Texas, which opened for day use June 1, lies along the namesake curl of the Rio Grande, marking the Mexican border.
At this renowned dark-sky park, you can count more than 2,000 stars — 10 times the number typically seen above most cities — surrounding the canvas of the Milky Way. During the days, especially when temperatures cool in the fall and early winter, enjoy 150 miles of trails throughout the park. You might be joined by a bird watcher or two, who roam Big Bend’s 1,200 square miles to spot more than 400 avian species.
Big Bend National Park, Big Bend National Park, Texas, 432477-2251
Arizona Petrified Forest
Instead of the Grand Canyon In east-central Arizona, 110 miles from Flagstaff, the Petrified Forest adjoins the Painted Desert, 7,500 square miles of badlands and hills tinted lavender and red by Triassic Age strata. The annual visitation of this park is one-tenth that of nearby Grand Canyon National Park.
The Petrified Forest, a drivethrough park, holds the greatest and most spectacular concentration of fossilized, coniferous tree logs in the world. Once a lush and subtropical climate, the forest of 200-foot-tall trees was buried by volcanic ash and preserved 225 million years ago. Now petrified into waxy, bright quartz, the tree pieces lay scattered across the Painted Desert, along with hundreds of plant and animal fossils, including dinosaurs, reptiles and ferns. The park also protects 1,000-year-old Ancestral Puebloan rock art.
Petrified Forest National Park, Petrified Forest, Ariz., 928-524National 6228
Utah Canyonlands
Instead of Arches National Park
Instead of ogling the sandstone formations in traffic-jammed Arches, opt for a wilderness desert experience amid the reddened Wingate sandstone in Canyonlands.
Canyonlands is southwest of the tourist mecca of Moab, Utah. Most visitors take the Island in the Sky scenic drive out to spectacular overlooks, but otherwise the 527-square-mile park has few roads.
Hardier souls go for multiday paddles down the gentle Green River, which, after its confluence with the Colorado, plunges into the maelstrom of Cataract Canyon.
Canyonlands National Park, Moab, Utah, 435-719-2313
Nevada Great Basin
Instead of the Grand Circle The Grand Circle marketing campaign pushed Utah’s national parks to record-setting visitations in recent years, but Great Basin — a few miles over the border in eastern Nevada — got left out of the loop. The 121square-mile park is named after the enormous basin it sits in (spanning nearly all of Nevada, it is 20 times larger than the park), which pulls all water underground so that it can’t reach the ocean and other waterways.
Yet this arid park has surprising diversity and, from cool caves as deep as 436 feet below ground to the 13,060-foot Wheeler Peak, a landscape like no other park you’ll visit.
Great Basin National Park, Baker, Nev., 775-234-7331
California Lassen Volcanic
Instead of Yellowstone or Yosemite national parks
In place of the crowded Yellowstone geysers or Yosemite mountains, a panorama of wildflowers, volcanic peaks and steaming fumaroles can be seen at Lassen Volcanic, 180 miles north of Sacramento. The 30mile park highway reopened in late May, along with most of the trails and overnight backcountry camping.
The still-smoking, glacier-clad Lassen Peak is one of only two volcanoes in the contiguous 48 states that erupted in the 20th century (Mount St. Helens erupted 40 years ago last month).
Lassen Volcanic National Park, Mineral, Calif., 530-5954480
Washington state North Cascades
Instead of Mount Rainier Although still emerging from snow banks and open for only day use, North Cascades is typically one of the less-visited parks of the entire parks system, seeing less than 3% of Mount Rainier’s yearly traffic. Adjoining the Canadian border, 120 miles northeast of Seattle, this wilderness has only 6 miles of internal roads — all unpaved — and stretches over 1,000 square miles. It boasts 312 glaciers (12 times Mount Rainier’s), as well as more than 500 lakes and a lush carpet of old-growth evergreens. From its dry ponderosa pines in the east to the temperate rain forest in the west, this is landscape of tremendous biodiversity.
It’s also a great place to beat the heat, watch one of the most intact wildlife populations in the lower 48 (the huge and remote acreage still offers ideal habitats for all its original species). But don’t forget to play, whether on day hikes or epic backpacking tours, perhaps peak bagging, fishing, boating or horseback riding.
North Cascades National Park, Sedro-woolley, Wash., 360854-7200