Last month, Mikah Meyer left Washington, D.C., for the road trip of a lifetime — to visit more than 400 sites within the U.S. National Park Service.
His journey — which will take him to every state in the union — has two goals: to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the park service and to honor his late father, who died before he could realize his dream of traveling across America.
As he makes his way across the country, Mikah will be sharing highlights of his adventure with VOA through photos and short web texts that he'll be sending to us on a regular basis.
Before starting his road trip, he told us, "This national park system is way more than these capital 'P' parks. It’s everything from national seashores to national monuments to national historical sites to national battlefields. It's this entire system that's so much more than just vistas.”
Here are two he visited this month:
Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore in Glen Arbor, Michigan, was recently named the "Most Beautiful Place in America" on ABC's Good Morning America. The area is as old as continental ice sheets and as young as the 1970 Establishment Act that set aside the lakeshore for preservation of the natural resources and public use.
The most prominent features, and those for which the park is named, are the high dunes above Lake Michigan. These immense sand dunes are “perched” atop the already towering headlands that are glacial moraines.
Cuyahoga Valley National Park in Ohio is refuge for a wide variety of native plants and wildlife. While it is only a short distance from the big cities of Akron and Cleveland, it seems worlds away.
The Cuyahoga River winds through open farmlands, rolling hills, deep forests and spectacular waterfalls.
Look for more awesome images and travel anecdotes from Mikah in the coming weeks.
