22 Less Crowded National Parks

agesilaus wrote:

DallasSteve wrote:
I have no experience with National Parks/National Forests. Can you explain the difference? Do National Forests have paved roads or campsites with hookups?

...The differences from our standpoint can be hard to see. NPS lands tend to have highly restrictive policies, don't pick up that rock for example. CG are usually developed but without hooksups of any sort.....

Have to disagree here with that last sentence above. Some major National Parks actually do have campgrounds with hookups. Yellowstone, Zion, Everglades, Grand Canyon, Grand Teton come to mind, and there are probably others. Do we also dry camp in some NPs? Sure, it’s all good!

Some National Forest and COE campgrounds put NPs to shame, though, with more modern sites with good roads, electric and often water.. I think the NPS budget keeps getting cut year by year, and modernizing the campgrounds is a low priority.

By the way, I thought that list would surely include New Mexico’s Chaco Culture National Historical Site as an uncrowded option. One of the most fascinating and least-visited national sites anywhere.

A ranger at Grand Teton NP years ago had the perfect description of the difference between the NP and adjoining NF when I asked where we could walk our dog. She said go to the NF, the difference is this dotted line on the map.I have found that to be true for most parks we visit.

As for Dry Tortugas NP, if you ever get down to Key West, splurge for the sea plane. It is AMAZING to see the ship wrecks, sea life, and sand bottom from the low flying plane. Take the afternoon flight and you will have the island to yourself after the ferry leaves. They provide snorkeling gear as part of the trip. One of the coolest NP experiences, and we have been to over 40 NP’s.

rbtglove wrote:
A good National Park that is not very crowded and is very impressive is Great Basin. Has a nice visitor center and a cave tour and great hiking. Kind of out of the way but worth a visit.

Lassen Volcanic is another lesser visited but very interesting park.


I imagine that we could easily put together a list of 25 or so less known parks from people that actually have visited them.

I was disappointed that Great Basin NP wasn’t on the list.

That convinced me that the research was poor.

DallasSteve wrote:
I have no experience with National Parks/National Forests. Can you explain the difference? Do National Forests have paved roads or campsites with hookups?

Yes, some national forest campgrounds have paved roads and hookups as do national parks. You just have to decide where you want to be and then search for information on the area/campground.

A good National Park that is not very crowded and is very impressive is Great Basin. Has a nice visitor center and a cave tour and great hiking. Kind of out of the way but worth a visit.

DallasSteve wrote:
I have no experience with National Parks/National Forests. Can you explain the difference? Do National Forests have paved roads or campsites with hookups?

From an RV standpoint there is no real difference between NP and NF. But the article had nothing to do with RV’s. Frankly RVs are not “camping” to most Europeans. They are caravaning. Camping implies carrying your tent, if any, on your backpack.

National Forests are under the Department of Agriculture. Their (DA) purpose is to manage the forests in a manner consistent with a goal of long term survival of a he forest. Except for designated wilderness areas, every part of the national forests is expected to be logged at some point. The DA is supposed the manage that so part of the forest is growing, part is near maturity, part is being replanted, etc.

The primary purpose of the Department of the Interior is focused on management of government owned lands outside of National Forests. The different agencies role goes from the National Park Service which allows almost no intrusive activity to the Bureau of Land Management which has goals of allowing and monitoring mining, cattle grazing, oil exploration and drilling on much of the government owned land.

Those are broad terms/ missions.

As far as management of campgrounds, the National Park Service has many. Most tend to be older, without utilities and have smaller sites. Even then, they are often among the most popular campgrounds in the country.

Frankly, the legislation which establishes each National Park makes it very difficult to upgrade many of those 60-70-80+ year old campgrounds.

The level of upgraded / RV friendly campgrounds varies by agency, but BLM in my experience seems to have many of the more RV friendly campgrounds within the DOI group.

(However, the infrastructure available greatly limits the ability to upgrade some of the most remote, most beautiful locations. It is simply impossible to get sufficient electricity or water or build large scale wastewater treatment plants in some locations).

National Forests have fewer restrictions, and given time and money, some forests are building upgraded campgrounds. Cagle and Double Lake campgrounds in the Sam Houston National Forest north of Houston are examples of excellent National Forest FHU campgrounds. They are also contract campgrounds, operated by a vendor, not NF rangers.

The largest agency in the US federal government that operates campgrounds is under the Department of Defense - the US Army Corps of Engineers. In some states like Texas and Arkansas, the COE operates dozens of campgrounds, many with FHU sites.

DallasSteve wrote:
I have no experience with National Parks/National Forests. Can you explain the difference? Do National Forests have paved roads or campsites with hookups?

There are a lot of different federal parks: National Parks, National Monuments, Forest Service Parks(USFS), Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Parks, Corps of Engineers(COE), National Historical Sites, National Grasslands and the list goes on and on. I have no idea why all these different types were created, ask your Washington politico.

The differences from our standpoint can be hard to see. NPS lands tend to have highly restrictive policies, don't pick up that rock for example. CG are usually developed but without hooksups of any sort.

USFS and BLM lands are generally less restrictive, you can pick up X pounds of rocks a day for example. From my experience they seem to have fewer rangers and don't have an entry fee, they are multi-use facilites. Which means there will be logging going on in USFS parks and maybe mines on BLM land. The campgrounds tend to be more on the primitive side but not always. CG fees are collected via the iron ranger if there is a fee. USFS has a lot of less developed CG off FS roads.

NPS lands you will get in trouble for driving off the marked roads, not so much in BLM/SFS lands. COE campgrounds are highly developed and always on a water body.

There is no hard and fast rule telling you what you will get.

I have no experience with National Parks/National Forests. Can you explain the difference? Do National Forests have paved roads or campsites with hookups?

This article has no clue whatsoever.
Check out item no. 15.
It has the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness as an alternate to Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore. These two places have NOTHING in common. The Dunes are an Urban Park, with the main attraction (most of those millions of visitors) being sandy beaches and warm water of Lake Michigan for the sun worshippers from the Chicago area. Yes, there are some trails and a small campground, but most people go to lay out on the beach.

The BWCA is a dedicated Wilderness area. No motors or mechanical devices are allowed, with just a few of its literally hundreds of small, connected lakes allowing 10 hp motors. People travel by canoe and carry their tents and food with them. Trails, called portages, connect the lakes and you hoist your canoe onto your shoulders and carry it to the next lake. You often stay out for 5 days to a week or more. Visitation is low because the number of entries is carefully limited to provide for solitude and a Wilderness experience.

Both of these places are wonderful and have their appeal. I know, because I worked as a Park Ranger at the Dunes, and I was the Program manager for the BWCA Wilderness. But they offer a completely different experience, and someone wanting to go to the Dunes would not find any sort of similar experience by going to the BWCA.

And in reality, neither of these two places is a National Park. Indiana Dunes is a National Lakeshore, administered by the National Park Service. The BWCA Wilderness is a part of Superior National Forest, administered by the U.S. Forest Service.

It makes me think that their other comparisons between parks (that I know nothing about) may be just as bogus.