Posts Tagged ‘mountains’
The Appalachians, largest mountain range in the Eastern US, culminates at its southern end in North Carolina and Tennessee. Those two states split Great Smoky Mountains National Park, which preserves one of the finest virgin deciduous forest in the world. The top of Clingsman’s Dome is the highest point in the Park, at 6,643 ft […]
Acadia National Park is my favorite landscape location on the East Coast because it packs in a small area (only 40,000 acres) such a great variety of scenery. The shoreline includes beaches, headlands, boulders, and slabs with a range of orientations. Large and small freshwater bodies are surrounded by two major forest types (eastern deciduous […]
Despite preserving some of America’s most beautiful mountain landscapes, only three hours from Seattle, North Cascades National Park remains one of the two least visited parks in the lower 48 states. It receives less than 20,000 visitors per year, the same amount as Yosemite receives in two days. The greater unit, referred to as North […]
Remoteness makes Big Basin National Park one of the least visited National Parks. The park lies 325 miles from El Paso, the closest major city. The three roads that lead to the park end there. They do not pass through to another location. A diverse topography, flora, and fauna surprise the visitor who takes the […]
You can see Mount Rainier, the centerpiece of Mount Rainier National Park, more than 100 miles away. The mountain looks huge even from Seattle. While within the park, you can see Mount Rainier from almost everywhere, several lakes around the mountain offer particularly scenic compositions where you can include the reflection of the mountain. When […]
Crater Lake is always stunning at first sight. No other lake combines such a nearly perfect large circular shape, deep blue color, and uniformly sheer surrounding cliffs almost two thousand feet high. However, past the first impression, many of the viewpoints around the lake lack either an unobstructed view, or interesting features. For this reason, […]
Glacier National Park preserves a part of the Northern Rockies that belongs to one of the most intact mountain ecosystems in America, where grizzlies, wolves, moose, mountain goats, and big horn sheep still roam. The heart of this environment is easily accessible from June to mid-October. During those months, you can drive the Going-To-The-Sun road, […]
Among all the mountains in America, the Grand Tetons – rocky, jagged, and abruptly rising seven thousand feet above the valley of Jackson Hole – remind me the most of the Alps, on the high peaks where I had my first life-changing wilderness experiences that inspired me to become a photographer. With many lakes laying […]
High above the Great Basin Desert in Nevada, the South Snake Range forms a vegetated island protected by Great Basin National Park. At the timberline, groves of Bristlecone pine trees grow, clinging to rocky ridges and cirques. The oldest living things on earth, those trees, with fantastically gnarled shapes and great texture, were already saplings […]
Kings Canyon National Park features two easily accessible sites: a beautiful sequoia grove (Grant Grove) and the deepest canyon in the country (the Middle Fork of the Kings – about twice the depth of the Grand Canyon), however at least 95% of the park is backcountry with no road access. Since in the previous posts […]
