National Parks Traveler

What authority does the National Park Service have to charge access fees in Great Smoky Mountains National Park and, presumably, other national parks? That question is the focus of a lawsuit filed in a bid to overturn the Smokies' move to charge backcountry users.

Yellowstone National Park's spring opening will be pushed back one to two weeks as the park searches for ways to meet budget cuts mandated by the sequestration ordered by President Obama and Congress.

In a reversal of seventy years of “vigorously suppressed” fires on the Blue Ridge Parkway, Superintendent Phil Francis has announced that 150 acres will be burned near Doughton Park “to return the site to a more natural vegetation type” and “increase the quality of wildlife habitat.”

Two weeks in Mount Rainier National Park left Russ Aquilar dirty, tired, and sore. But it also left him with a life-changing decision, to share the natural world with others.

The National Park Service recently released a prospectus soliciting bids for the operation of a relatively small retail store in the Yorktown area of Colonial National Historical Park.

Spring break is commencing at colleges around the country, and for more than 200 students that means a trip not to the beach, but to a national park to participate either in the National Park Service Academy or an "Alternative Spring Break" program in parks.

Remember that Japanese dock, cast adrift by a tsunami back in 2011, that came ashore at Olympic National Park? It's going to cost more than $600,000 to remove it.

The Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias has been attracting visitors to what is now Yosemite National Park for 150 years. Much has changed since Abraham Lincoln signed a bill setting aside the Grove as a protected site, and the National Park Service is accepting public comments on plans to restore the area.

When I tell people that I teach a summer course on the politics of Yellowstone, I always brace myself for the next question. “What politics can there be in a national park?” Plenty, as it turns out.

With all the winter storms pummeling the nation, it's hard to believe that spring really isn't too far off for many parts of the country. At Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area that will be evident next weekend when the National Park Service and the Millbrook Village Society present a maple sugaring demonstration at Millbrook Village.