Growing up in New Mexico has probably colored my opinions but here they are
Carlsbad caverns
White sands national park
Choco canyon
I live in Western Colorado for a reason. I have easy access to all of the great parks in Utah, Norther Arizona, Northern New Mexico, Southern Wyoming, & the Colorado Rockies.
You want a list? No way it would be way too long. If you want to be alone, try the state & county parks. Of course there is the BLM land as well.
The Colorado National Monument is almost in my back yard. It is one mile away. I hike it often.
Growing up west of PDX, I played in the Coast Range Mountains. While they can not be compared to the Rockies, they are amazing unto themselves. I have hiked from the Columbia river into Northern California using both the Oregon beaches and the Coast range mountains. Not all at once, though I wish I could have. Some parts of the beach are not passable due to high cliffs. I know, I tried.
The one thing that Oregon got right is the beaches are all public access.
My favorite is Cuyahoga Valley National Park.
Lots of interesting discoveries for hikers.
Garden of the gods
The most amazing hike I’ve ever taken was in Usige Ban Provincial Park in Nova Scotia.
Zion is unique because you cannot drive in most of the park. You have to ride shuttle buses. It sounds odd but it works well ,you normally don’t wait long for a bus.
Only in the valley, which, granted is the most popular part of the park. And off season you can drive the full park. We stayed at the Zion Lodge which allowed us to set off hiking before dawn and beat all the folks coming on the shuttles. We were on the top of Angel’s Landing before the first bus dropped off. But there’s lots of other parts of the park that are really cool hiking that most folks don’t ever see.
I like Assateague because my friends can go sit on the beach, and I can stay back in the town of Chincoteague, Virginia, and eat oysters. Raw, fried, and in fritters.
My first choice is Acadia, in Maine, because the Ukuele Lady and the kinder can hike and bike in the park while I read books On the deck at our cottage alongside a pond near Pretty Marsh. On the Quiet Side of the island, where the tourists don’t go.
Also, there are no chain stores or fast food outlets on Mt. Desert Island.
It is a bit misleading. The first sentence on their website is:
“From the prominence of Dead Horse Point, 2,000 feet above a gooseneck in the Colorado River, an ever-changing landscape unfurls.”
That along with he beautiful picture of the Colorado river on that page implies that the colorado river is visible. But it doesn’t actually say so. Certainly the park is too far away.
In a warm season, venture north from the head of the Portland Canal (Hyder AK / Stewart BC) above a growling glacier into a basin that looks like the fucking cover of CLAN OF THE CAVE BEAR. Expect mammoths to emerge at any point.
I forgot to mention Horseshoe Canyon in southern Utah. It’s part of Canyonlands, but separated from the rest of the park.
A long hike through the canyon, past dinosaur tracks, leads to the Great Gallery, an 80-foot wall with some magnificent ancient rock art, portraying life-size figures with intricate geometric details. Simply breathtaking!
Yes, it’s the place where, several years ago, Aron Ralston had to amputate his own arm, as portrayed in the film 127 Hours.
Craters Of The Moon National Monument in SE Idaho. It doesn’t have the visual grandeur of many of the places mentioned but it is a fascinating(to me anyway) history of the movement of the North American Plate over the Yellowstone hotspot. Also touring it is a great combination of driving and walking
Yellowstone is three of the best natural parks in the country, all right on top of each other. It’d be worth going just to see the wildlife, or just to see the canyon, or just to see the thermal features. All three? A no-brainer.
And I’ll also put in a word for Glacier. The glaciers themselves are mostly gone, but the mountains are still amazing. You feel their massiveness, in a way I’ve never experienced with any other mountains elsewhere.
Yellowstone absolutely blew me away.
Hawaii Volcanoes National Park is, I’m afraid, a shadow of its former self at the moment. Many of the good trails are off-limits, and the Jaeger Museum is so badly damaged they don’t plan to re-open it (one hopes eventually they’ll replace it, but I haven’t heard what the plans are, if they have made any).
Don’t get me wrong, if you’ve never been there before it’s still worth a visit, and one excellent trail (Kilauea Iki - if you are in reasonably good shape I highly recommend it) recently reopened. But to those of us familiar with HVNP in its glory days, it’s sad to see how little of it is currently open to visitors.
IMO the best day hike in the park, and easily among the best hiking destinations anywhere. It’s not easy (~15 miles round trip), but less severe than the hike to Half Dome and WAY less crowded.
The final half mile and the summit itself are beyond remarkable. To your left (southeast) is a valley 2000’ below; to your right is a 5000’ granite wall, sloping down (at about 45 degrees) to the amazing Tenaya Canyon. To the southwest you look down on the summit of Half Dome and into Yosemite Valley, with unique views of Glacier Point, El Cap, etc.
The White River just below the Beaver Lake Dam in Eureka Springs Arkansas. Just me and my fly rod
So many good memories stirred by this thread.
Grand Tetons NP is the surprise gateway to Yellowstone. I was with a group of friends and I planned a day there (having been as a youth) and they were skeptical about that…until we turned around a bend and they really saw them…wonderful place.
Yellowstone…so much to see and experience.
And one I don’t think has been mentioned yet: Badlands National Park in S. Dakota, awesome scenery that just goes on and on. Combined with Custer Park and Devil’s Tower, you can easily kill 3-4 days there.
Overseas…I have had the great fortune to be able to go to the Galapagos islands twice in my life. Wildlife you can walk up to, scenery of every type…see it if you can.
Machu Picchu–Amazing.
But the single most incredible thing I’ve done was riding a hot air balloon at dawn over the Masai Maru with the great herds of Africa below me. Nothing else comes close.
Olympic National Park, especially the coastline, including Ruby Beach.
Not a national park, but Engelberg, except for Titlis (way too many tourists wanting to “bag” Titlis).
The Foz de Arbayún, which is pocket-sized compared with any American one but still pretty spectacular.
The Foz de Lumbier, a few kilometers downriver, gets a lot more visitors, but Arbayún has been a favorite of mine since I started being old enough to have favorites.
Exactly what I was thinking. Specifically, the col between Mt. Monroe and Mt. Washington (just north of the Lakes of the Clouds going up Crawford Path). I could spend days and days just kicked back on a couple rocks watching the clouds with the rest of New England stretched out below. Winter, summer, doesn’t matter. My wife has even commented how good a mood I am in after a day up there. The most perfect spot on the planet.