Necessary National Parks

We'll chalk up this post as filler, some thoughts that coalesced out of daydreams today. But in its own way, this list is important. I want to see all of these places before I die. That might not be feasible, although the two topping the list and potentially three more parks will be visited in September.

I haven't visited any great number of parks, but some critical ones - Yellowstone (twice), Glacier (three times), Joshua Tree, Hawaii Volcanoes, Rocky Mountain, Grand Canyon, and Theodore Roosevelt. If fortune had not brought me there, those would clog up the list. Glacier is my favorite, Yellowstone is the essential, and Roosevelt is the most underrated and least visited.

Fortunately, there are still vistas to intoxicate the senses.

10. Great Sand Dunes National Park (Colorado)
The dunes rise 750 in a valley rimmed by 13,000-foot peaks in Colorado's San Luis Valley. Ideally, it would be paired with a trip through Mesa Verde and the Black Canyon of the Gunnison, but this would be the centerpiece of a rural Colorado driving tour.

9. Grand Canyon's North Rim (Arizona)
Visiting the southern rim in 2003 only got me halfway there. Closed in winter, the north rim sits at higher elevation and receives fewer visitors. I'm guessing pictures don't it justice either.

8. Big Bend (Texas)
I first saw this stretch of West Texas border country when Harry Dean Stanton rambled across it in Paris, Texas. Since then I've mapped my way there a dozen times. Big Bend features high peaks, desert vegetation, some beautiful canyons carved by the Rio Grande and of course, illegal immigrants and drug dealers crossing the border. I probably won't rush on this one.

7. Acadia (Maine)
This cluster of Maine shoreline and islands has the highest point on the Atlantic Coast. Someday I want to see the sun rise there.

6. Zion (Utah)
This almost happened in January, but I couldn't make the math work for the drive from Las Vegas. Furthermore, those beautiful canyons have roads connecting them with the other Utah parks. It will be best to hit this one in winter, because a shuttle bus runs most of the year, and in the cooler winter months, it's still accessible to private vehicles.

5. Great Basin (Nevada)
Three hundred miles from Las Vegas and 230 from Salt Lake City, this park must be hit on a clear night, because it's one of the darkest places in the Lower 48. I want a tent, a sleeping bag and the bright band of the Milky Way lighting the night. Great Basin NP has a huge collection of bristlecone pines, the oldest trees in the world. They can exceed 5,000 years, and their needles alone can push 40. Its signature mountain, Wheeler Peak, is among Nevada's highest.

4. Yosemite (California)
Between Half Dome, the sequoias, El Capitan and the waterfalls, John Muir's favorite park is a trip unto itself. After watching 12 hours of national park history, I can't escape Yosemite.

3. Denali (Alaska)
North America's highest peak, Denali or Mt. McKinley, as we call it in the Lower 48. Large population of grizzly bears and other megafauna. Glaciers. Unpaved roads. Steep drops. Pristine wilderness. This one could take the longest between the expense involved and the time commitment. Spending time up there requires plenty of preparation.

2. Redwood National & State Park (California)
Since kindergarten, I always tried to imagine the redwood forests which populated Woody Guthrie's This Land is your Land (our sanitized public school version left out the more socialist verses). Later I found out the forests of Endor were really just coastal redwoods, the world's tallest trees. My interest never dimmed, but free time and funds made these type of trips difficult until I left journalism.

The collection of remaining redwoods totals just 5 percent of the original grove which stretched along the northern California coast. I'm obviously not wired like the people who saw those giant trees only to profit and opportunity. From ground level, I can only imagine the majesty of trees five times as old as this nation.

1. Crater Lake (Oregon)
This one also goes back a long time, possibly to the third or fourth grade, when I first heard about the country's deepest lake, a blue beauty on top of an ancient volcano. After Glacier National Park, it's easily the place I've most wanted to see.

The list for Crater Lake runs longs - driving the rim drive, hiking one of the peaks for a panoramic view, taking a boat tour to see the log that has floated upright in the lake for more than a century, and staying at the lodge. If pictures and words cannot adequately sum these places, I have to make the most of my time there.