2016 marks the 100th anniversary of the National Park Service. If you haven’t had an opportunity to visit one or more of our Country’s most awe-inspiring places, I’d suggest that you get it on your bucket list. Recently, I had one of those once-in-a-lifetime experiences driving with my son Ryan in his ’99 Dodge pickup 2,956.3 miles from Carversville, Pennsylvania to Reno, Nevada where he was headed for college. There are lots of stories from the trip (fortunately the truck made it without a breakdown), but one that stands out was a visit we made to Rocky Mountain National Park along the way. I had been to the Park twice before, 18 and 30 years ago, so what amazed me was that nothing had changed. It was like a time warp. No commercialization had taken over, no new roads had been cut, no hotels had sprouted. The Park looked just the way I remembered it with beautiful mountain vistas, tall trees, and wild elk and mountain goats wandering free. I was thrilled to share it with my 18-year-old son.
That’s what our National Parks are all about, preserving those wild special places so that we will be able to share them with generations to come. I’ve now checked dozens of National Parks and Monuments off of my bucket list including Zion, Capitol Reef, Bryce Canyon, Glacier, Yellowstone, Grand Canyon, Crater Lake, Redwood Forest, and locally Independence National Park, and Gettysburg to name a few. I can’t wait to explore Yosemite in California and Denali in Alaska someday.
A while back art270 created a series of birding guidebooks for New Jersey Audubon followed by road signs for the New Jersey Department of Transportation to identify some of the many scenic byways to be traveled around the State. I was just told by a little bird (or for you non-birding types, it was actually a tufted titmouse) that the Delaware Bayshore Scenic Byway signs are now being installed. How many of these signs have you spotted in your travels through New Jersey? If you send us an Instagram(art270inc), a Tweet(@art270) or simply an image of you standing next to a New Jersey Byways sign, we’ll post the collection on our website and Facebook page and send you a gift card for Rita’s Italian Ice to help extend your summer a bit longer.
