National Geographic Guide to the National Parks of the United States, 5th Ed.

Found this book to be a tremendous help in deciding where to go and what to see. We traveled to the Badlands, Yellowstone, The Grand Tetons, Arches National Park, Canyonlands, Bryce, Zion, Grand Canyon, Painted Desert and The Petrified Forest. This book was a tremendous time saver. It allowed us to find the best viewing areas quickly and we did not miss any of the important sights. Well worth the modest price.

This is a good book for you to reference when you plan your trip to NP.

This is the best book I have ever seen on the National Parks. The photography alone is worth the price. It gives very comprehensive advice on each park, and you can tell by the way it is written that these people have actually been to, and spent time, in each park. I love the way it breaks down each park into suggested amounts of time so that you can better plan your trip. There are maps for each park, and in the maps is my only complaint. Most of the maps cover more than one page and because there is very little page border down the center, it can make it difficult to see the center of the maps. Other than that, it truly is an awesome book, whether you actually get to travel to the parks or not.

If you are visiting National Parks and want a useful guide to help plan your day(s) this book should be on your list. It goes beyond the quick synopsis you get in AAA guides and describes worthwhile stops and hikes at all the National Parks in the U.S.

I just bought the 2006 version of this useful resource to replace my trusty 1989 (!!) original. The new one includes up-to-date content (e.g., Joshua Tree is now a National Park, no longer a National Monument tucked away in the "Excursions" section) but I have two major gripes:

#1. I was surprised that so many of the photos haven't changed since 1989 (and who knows how long they were taken before that) except for some that are actually worse. One example is the frontispiece photo for the Yellowstone section. In the 2006 volume it is an under-exposed, super-contrasty shot of the terraces of Mammoth Hot Springs. Disappointingly (given the incredible opportunities to portray the visual variety that is Yellowstone) there is a second quite similar photo 6 pages later of another section of Mammoth. In my old book, the Yellowstone frontispiece is a lovely shot of the lower falls of the Yellowstone River completely missing from 2006. The other photos, in this section at least, are unchanged. So what's wrong with that? They're OLD. The colors are overly-saturated in the traditional National Geographic style, some with the contrast hiked so high that the details are lost. I admit this is perhaps a matter of taste. It's just a missed opportunity to improve the illustrations, and good ones are always very useful!

#2. There is a dearth of Web information. Each park's URL is listed, but not those of the associated excursion locations such as near-by wildlife refuges and national forests, all of which do have Web pages, nor for the lodging concessionaires.

Having said all that, I find this book to be a particularly useful jumping off point for Web research. It's well-organized, though due to the volume of material, understandably, none of the descriptions contains great detail. But most of what I want to know is there: what's the best time to visit? what are the gateway communities and in-park accommodations options? The maps are readable and sufficient for planning purposes. I particularly like the Excursions sections describing what other interesting areas are in proximity to the parks.

The book is compact, dense and heavy, easy to navigate, with a much-improved index so you no longer have to know what region a park is assigned to find it.

I definitely do recommend the National Geographic Guide to National Parks of the United States to help make decisions and plans for travel to our parks and surrounds.