It’s the warm season and the U.S. masses are on the go and amassing in the great outdoors. The one downside? The crowds. To commemorate the country’s vast outdoors offerings, The Manual offers readers the chance to dodge the crowds with some of the least visited national parks. The more obscure preserves are just as majestic as their more famous brethren while hosting just a fraction of the crowds. Here’s your chance to visit some of the least visited and little-known U.S. national parks during the height of the outdoors season.
Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve, Alaska
Let’s begin with a big one: Gates of the Arctic National Park in Alaska. Seeing as there are no roads, trails, or established campgrounds over nearly 8.5 million untouched acres, this is a dream destination for many an outdoor lover. Campers and hikers need to make sure that they’ve planned, practiced, and planned again for the Arctic adventure, though. Hiking the wilds above the Arctic Circle is no joke.
Gates of the Arctic is the number one least-visited national park, so besides travel mates, the only souls who will be sharing the land are the Native people who have nurtured this ecosystem for thousands of years. Spend days on end fishing alpine lakes and rivers, watching the caribou herds and brown bear pad through rolling valleys. Stop to picnic with only the water and the boreal forest wind to bother you.
Nps.gov says it best: “Gates of the Arctic is one of the last truly wild places on earth.”
National Park of American Samoa
From one of the largest national parks to one of the smallest, visitors are certainly not losing any remoteness traveling to the National Park of American Samoa. The second-least visited national park is also its third-smallest by area, stretching across three islands. Located in the South Pacific thousands of miles from the mainland, the protected habitat is the country’s only national park in the Southern Hemisphere.
Sitting in the tropics graces American Samoa with a warm, Polynesian climate that welcomes outdoors travelers. Share sprawling sand beaches with sea turtles and rainforests teeming with tropical birds. Climb volcanic mountains that rise from the trees, and dive into the coral and sea communities that thrive beneath the waves.
Cuyahoga Valley National Park, Ohio
Flying from U.S. outposts to its heartland, Cuyahoga Valley National Park is a hidden treasure nestled in between Akron and Cleveland. Ohio’s only national park, Cuyahoga offers four seasons of recreational fun worlds away from workaday life.
The easiest access to the park is from the converted and historic trail following the Cuyahoga Scenic Railroad. Step off the track to find over 30,000 acres spread over the winding Cuyahoga River basin. Wilderness explorers will encounter shade broken by dappled sunlight under an extensive forest canopy. Along the way, visit riverbanks that harbor amphibians, avians, and reptiles, and cascading waterfalls spraying cool water. In the cold season when hiking and biking can be tough, and strap on snowshoes to fight cabin fever and enjoy a quiet, isolated haven.
Also running through Ohio’s lone national park is the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad, which adds some historical context to all the outdoor fun.
Great Sand Dunes National Park, Colorado
Just four hours south of Denver by car, Rio Grande River sand deposits have gathered to form the tallest dunes in North America, some almost 800-feet high. Like stepping straight from the Rockies into the Arabian Desert, golden brown sands stretch for as far as the eye can see. Ironically, Great Sand Dunes feature some of the most diverse ecosystems, flora, and fauna of any wild land in the U.S. Here visitors can find aquatic ibises on alpine shores, northern moose munching forest branches, and lizards darting between hot desert rocks.
Surrounding the dunes are grasslands, wetlands, lakes and rivers, and ancient, high mountain forests. The best part of Great Sand Dunes might not even be the day. Moonless nights in official Dark Sky territory give way to an ocean of stars.
Congaree National Park, South Carolina
Speaking of biodiversity, Congaree National Park in South Carolina is home to an astonishing number of birds, forest creatures, and marine wildlife. This biodiversity is fed by waters from the Congaree and Wateree Rivers, which form the floodplain that bring the nutrients that feed and support the largest intact expanse of old-growth bottomland hardwood forest in the southeastern United States.
Being one of the least-visited national parks adds to Congaree’s mystique. Ride along on mystic rivers, under 11,000 acres of possumhaw, water hickory, loblolly pine, laurel oak, swamp tupelo, and sweetgum trees. Keep an eye out for otters peeking heads out of the water, and bobcats sneaking amidst the underbrush. More than 25 miles of hiking trails are available for the more intrepid while a 2.4-mile boardwalk trail gives a gentler route through the ancient wood.
No need to worry about funds. Three free permit-required campgrounds give plenty of space to throw down your pack for the evening.
The National Park System is bigger than just the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, and Yosemite. The continental U.S. and its far-flung states and territories offer hundreds of square miles to escape humanity’s constant honking to seek peace in lesser-known and obscure corners of this great country.
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