Vacation planning resources for the U.S. National Parks, including Yosemite, Glacier, Death Valley, Grand Canyon. Info, tips and photos by Tom Bricker.
The Ahwahnee Hotel is the flagship National Park lodge at Yosemite National Park, designed with a blend of rustic architecture and luxury. It’s a National Historic Landmark that was designed by architect Gilbert Stanley Underwood. The Ahwahnee was temporarily renamed the Majestic Yosemite Hotel three years ago due to a legal dispute between the National Park […]
Pinnacles National Park is a U.S. National Park in Northern California, south of San Francisco and an hour inland from Monterey Bay. It’s known mostly for its stunning rock-spires formed by an extinct volcano and an abundance of California Condors. Pinnacles was established as the United States’ 59th National Park, elevating it from a National […]
Thanks to craggy peaks, pristine lakes, and more, the Canadian Rockies is one of the most iconic photography locations in the world. Yoho, Jasper, and Banff National Parks feature Canada’s finest mountain ranges, making these places a bucket list destination for many photographers. Even after visiting all of these places, the Canadian Rockies remain on […]
If you’ve perused the National Parks category of the blog, you might know that I’m a huge NPS enthusiast. In this post, I wanted to share my favorite parks from Maine to Hawaii, and everywhere in between. For a number of years growing up, we took two vacations every year: Florida in the late winter […]
Muir Woods National Monument is a 550 acre park filled with old growth coastal redwoods; a humbling place just outside of San Francisco, California in Golden Gate National Recreation Area. In this post, we’ll share some thoughts and photos of these giant trees. If you’ve never seen redwood and sequoia trees, it’s an absolute must-do on any […]
Grinnell Glacier Trail is a 12-mile roundtrip hike in Glacier National Park starting at Swiftcurrent Lake and leading to Upper Grinnell Lake, with some beautiful scenery along the way. In this post, I’ll share photos from the hike and my experience doing it, along with other info so you can prepare for this hike. For […]
If you only have 1-day in Sequoia National Park (and Kings Canyon!), here’s what I recommend seeing. Everything on this list can be accomplished in a day or under as part of a relatively quick stop on a California road trip. In fact, that’s the only way I’ve ever visited Sequoia National Park–driving up from Bakersfield, […]
Recently, we hiked out to see the “firehose flow” at Kīlauea Volcano’s Kamokuna ocean lava entry in Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park. This post is about our experience hiking out to the viewing area, along with some photos of the lava entering the ocean. I’ll also provide some lava viewing & photography tips, and recommendations for […]
If you like lobster and seafood, you’ll find a lot of great restaurants in Bar Harbor & Mount Desert Island, Maine, all of which are near Acadia National Park. We are big lobster fans, so on our visit to Maine, we made sure to have lobster for every single meal. Literally. Lobster for breakfast, lobster […]
Yosemite National Park is quite possibly the most beautiful location in all of California (or even the United States) with great options for photography ranging from unique mountains to rivers to waterfalls to even gorgeous lodging. It’s truly an oasis for landscape photographers, and it’s no surprise that it draws us in herds. If you’ve […]