Olmsted Island is a favorite vantage point for viewing the Great Falls of the Potomac.

I spent only a fraction of my life in West Virginia, but I'll never forget the state's beauty. Many people associate West Virgina with strip mining, but if you head into the mountains and down the hollows you can find incredible beauty. This scene is one of the more secluded to be found along the New River Gorge National River.

If all your trip to Kings Canyon National Park entails is a stop at Grant Grove, you've missed a fabulous landscape. This shot, taken near road's end in Cedar Grove, is a teaser of what lies beyond for those who shoulder a pack and take to the backcountry.

Too often we enter a national park and spend much of our time looking at the landscape, not into it.

William Calder, a software engineer, captured this Barred Owl in Shenandoah after it buzzed his truck and took up a nearby roost. It's a great reminder of the wonderful wildlife the national park system protects, and what we can see if we take the time to look.

Ms. Timmerman lives in Kalispell, Montana, only about 35 miles from the west entrance of Glacier National Park. As a member of a local photography club, she frequently heads into the park.

"Almost weekly I go there to get my 'peace fix' and to photograph nature," she says. "In the summer I camp on the east side to be able to spend more time hiking and photographing the sights in that area. Both the east and west sides of Glacier offer great photo opportunities.

"I love to photograph the mountains, lakes, and wildflowers of Glacier and also the Canadian Rockies."

There are charismatic terrestrial fauna, and then there are charismatic marine fauna. And I'd offer that this butterfly fish that Paul Brown focused on in the waters of National Park of American Samoa surely falls into the latter category.

Definitely makes you want to take up skin- or scuba-diving, no?

The National Park Service's Fire and Aviation Management Program sponsors an annual photo contest that has been drawing a growing number of entries from park staff.

Plum Run cuts through the center of the Gettysburg Battlefield and flows into the "Valley of Death" near the Round Tops.

Sometimes you just want to get away from it all, and with winter dragging on here in the Rocky Mountains, this shot of Dry Tortugas National Park certainly seems inviting. No roads lead directly to the park. Instead, you either need a boat, or a seaplane, to get there.

On a clear day....Great Sand Dunes National Park looks great from outer space. This image, provided by NASA, was taken from the International Space Station in October 2007.