Thanksgiving week brought a lot of snow to much of the country. I returned home to find 8-9 inches of the white stuff in the yard, and a decided chill (low teens) in the air. All of which naturally got me thinking about how to enjoy the winter months in the cold weather side of the National Park System. If you’re looking to enjoy parks chilled and blanketed by winter, here are some destinations to consider.
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Comments
This is a really fantastic, comprehensive list! There is SO much to do in the National Parks in the winter, and the added bonus is the lack of crowds. Getting out and enjoying winter can make it your favorite season.
It's good to see an increasing number of parks encouraging hikers & snowshoers to avoid cross-country ski tracks where possible. Non-skiers might wonder what the problem is. XC skis glide on the tips & tails, and grip when the middle is weighted. Snowshoe tracks and boot postholes can cause loss of traction when part of the middle of the ski does not contact the snow. Inconsistently compressed snowshoe tracks also increase the chances of snow sticking to skis. Experts can deal with these problems, but they can be very discouraging for beginning skiers.
Our historically snowiest park, Mount Rainier, is not mentioned in this article. Just as well, the National Weather Service recently tweeted that former world snowfall record station Paradise had the driest November in fifty years and the third skimpiest snowpack in over a century of measurements:
https://twitter.com/NWSSeattle/status/1201731799769944064
https://www.nps.gov/mora/planyourvisit/winter.htm
Thanks for the kind words, Julie. We tried to provide a nice cross-section of the many opportunities out there in the parks, and wish we could have provided more. I'm sure other readers could add to these suggestions.