PADDLE THE BOUNDARY WATERS CANOE AREA WILDERNESS AND VOYAGEURS NATIONAL PARK
Together, these two destinations, adjacent to each other on Minnesota’s northern border, feature more than 1,000 lakes, 900 islands and 1,200 miles of canoe and kayak routes spread across more than 1 million acres. And talk about social distancing—because they are accessed by few roads and navigable almost entirely by water, Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCAW) and Voyageurs National Park are some of the most remote and undeveloped wilderness areas left in the country.
Less adventurous sorts can stay on the edge of one of these sites and venture in by day or take a daylong guided fishing trip.
In Voyageurs, non-paddlers can rent a houseboat and/or take a rangerled tour on a park boat. The area also offers some of America’s best stargazing, with Voyageurs named an International Dark Sky Park, and BWCAW earning the higher Dark Sky Sanctuary status last year—only the 13th spot worldwide to receive this title, as well as the largest.
Towering mountains of sand, some more than 700 feet high, that stretch for more than 30 miles along the foot of the Sangre de Cristo range—some might consider that reason enough to visit Great Sand Dunes National Park & Preserve in Colorado’s remote San Luis Valley. But in recent years sandboarding has become the park’s biggest claim to fame, with fans of the sport careening down the steep slopes on boards specially designed for maximum speed and minimum friction.
But it’s not as easy as it looks, as Sarah Watson, 39, of Fort Collins, Colo., found out when she and her husband, David, 43, visited with their son, Isaac, 13, and daughter, Natalie, 10. “I had been to the sand dunes when I was young myself, and I remember having a blast, so we thought sandboarding would be perfect for our kids to try out,” Watson says. “We tried to stand up like surfers but ended up pretty much crashing in the sand and filling our socks, so we all preferred to go down just sitting on the board holding onto the sides. You still go superfast, and the kids wanted to go over and over again.”
You don’t have to be a daredevil to be wowed by these monumental mounds of sand. Set aside a day to climb 742-foot Hidden Dune, the tallest dune in North America, or relax at Medano Creek, where kids can splash in the water and build sandcastles at Colorado’s “natural beach.”