Now that The Obamas have come and gone, Yellowstone National Park can get down to business managing their August crowds. While advance planning is advised during this peak travel month, in the past week or so we’ve heard reports of people getting rooms inside the park on the day of their arrival. If you’re not one of them, check out this video of an iconic Yellowstone experience. 

Q: We’re going camping at the Fishing Bridge campground in Yellowstone National Park and I would like to bike with my 6-year-old son. How can I find the bike trails? Will the trails be rugged? What kind of tires should I put on his bike?A: I contacted Yellowstone and they said that there is a biking trail relatively close to the Fishing Bridge Campground called the Natural Bridge Trail. It starts near the Bridge Bay Marina. It’s recommended that you use mountain bike tires on this trail.In addition, it’s important to note that there are no bicycle trails adjacent to park roads, and riding on the main roadway is not considered safe for a child. Bicycles are not allowed on any park hiking trails or in off-road backcountry areas,either.Bicycle riders on public roadways in Yellowstone must obey the same rules and regulations that apply to motorized vehicles. Bikes must also have a white light on the front and a red light or reflector on the rear during periods of low visibility.

The cables are up to help hikers climb the vertigo-inducing Half Dome in Yosemite National Park. This 10-hour  iconic American hike is not for the out-of shape or the faint-of-heart. To get an idea of both the agony and the ecstasy involved , check out this informative and inspiring video.

Q: A reader wrote asking for tips about traveling to the pacific islands of American Samoa, specifically the National Park of American Samoa.  A:  American Samoa is a five hour flight from Honolulu, and Hawaiian Airlines only flies into Tutuila, the main island, on Thursdays and Sundays. The National Park is located on three islands: Tutuila, Ofu and Tau. A twin prop plane will take you to the remote islands. Because weather challenges can delay those inter-island flights, the experts at the National Park of American Samoa recommend a stay of at least ten days if you want to experience all three islands. That sounds like good advice to us because each island offers very unique experiences. Tutuila has a well-maintained hiking trail system through its rainforest. Ofu has what is agreed to be some of the most gorgeous stretches of beach in the world. Tau is more secluded and is perfect for the adventurous traveler who likes to have a guide (you tell someone at the park the night before you need one, and a cousin or friend will appear the next morning) hack their way through trails with a machete. In terms of accomodations, the place to stay on Ofu is Vaoto Lodge, which has nine guest rooms and serves meals family style. On Tutuila and  Tau, a great way to experience local culture is to take part in the park’s “home stay” program. More like a bed & breakfast than a standard hotel, the home stay program allows you to live with a local family for a fee of between $30 and $40 a night. Snorkeling is a big draw on Ofu (the water is not readily accessible on the other two islands), with over 250 species of coral. But you’ll need to bring your own snorkels, masks and fins as there aren’t any for rent on any of the islands.  

University of Colorado biogeochemist Jason Neff was working on a geological mapping project in Canyonlands National Park in Utah for a period of weeks a few years ago. “Some days we could see for a hundred miles, literally,” he said. “And on other days we couldn’t see for five.” Neff was interested in what was causing the phenomenon, and he set out on a research project on dust in the West that was published earlier this year. He wanted to find out whether the dust in the air was a recent phenomenon or if it was a natural part of the desert atmosphere. He spoke about his research to a group at the Center for Environmental Journalism in Boulder last week.

With a team of other scientists, he took core samples from the sediments at the bottom of alpine lakes in Colorado’s San Juan Mountains; these lakes are downwind from most of the major deserts in the United States. The core samples let him and his colleagues analyze depositions over the past 5,000 years. What they found was startling; in the past 150 years, the amount of dust falling in the alpine lakes was 5 times greater than the average over the past 5,000 years. The study found an enormous spike in the amount of dust immediately following the Pacific Railway Act of 1862, which ushered in the era of settlement and grazing in the West. Neff believes that it is the overgrazing of arid public lands (and most of the West is federal land) that has broken up fragile soils and led to the dramatic increase in soil erosion and resulting dust in the air. “Dust storms are a big issue out there; sometimes they close down I-70 in Utah,” Neff said. “People tend to think it’s just part of being in the desert, but it’s similar to what was happening during the Dust Bowl years in the Midwest.”

The impact on visibility in national parks — an irritant to tourists and residents — is the least of the problems caused by the dust, which carries pollutants, viruses and bacteria, as well as fine particles of clay and silt. Huge amounts of top soil are lost and other impacts range from human health (respiratory difficulties) to increased rates of snowmelt in the Rockies in spring (Dust storms in February often turn whole ranges from pristine white to dingy brown). The report, released in February, made national headlines because the summary pointed out that the West is 500 percent dustier than it was before settlement. Neff said Saturday Night Live’s Weekend Update segment parodied the report by suggesting the increased dust was due to a dramatic surge in Hummel figurine collecting.

Aspen at Bear Lake.

It was “free” weekend at Rocky Mountain National Park, meaning everyone in Denver with a car came on Saturday and Sunday to see the aspens change and the elk bugle — two events that decisively mark the season in Colorado. I made the mistake of arriving mid-morning Saturday, with everyone else. There is something very, very wrong about a traffic jam in a national park. I parked and took a hiker’s shuttle, which was also functioning more like the Ginza line in Tokyo than a serene transport to the wonders of nature. All that receded into the background once I’d gotten a mile onto the trails. More than 90 percent of the visitors to Yellowstone National Park never set foot off of concrete, and I suspect the ratio holds in Rocky. That’s as sad as a traffic jam in a national park, but it’s just as true.

The mountains grandly presided over the various processions and spectacles. Elk bugled and mated as tourists idiotically wandered toward them with their digital cameras held in front of the their faces like chalices to the altar. I did my hike, endured another jam-packed shuttle ride (with the driver cursing all the cars illegally parked on the sides of the road) and spent part of the afternoon with the milling crowds in Estes Park; more traffic jams, and shoulder to shoulder on the sidewalks. At a coffee shop, the kid at the counter laughed hysterically when I asked him if he considered it a busy day. “Medium,” he said. “Check it out in August.”

The next day I got to the Bear Lake parking lot at 7:30 a.m. and had it to myself. I wanted to climb a mountain and I chose Flattop, an relatively easy 12,320-foot peak. It was a 4.4 mile hike with a 3,000-foot elevation gain. The woods were mostly empty. I ran into a couple of local hikers in their 60s with “Beep or honk when passing” signs attached to their daypacks. The man was a transplant from Jordan, Minn. He was wearing an “Up a Mountain, Down a Beer” T-shirt. “This is what we do on Sundays,” he said.

The trail was rocky, but gently graded, and relentlessly sloped upward. The trees got smaller and more sparsely distributed the higher I got. In 90 minutes, I was above the treeline. The wind picked up. I could see snowy peaks, eye-dropper lakes and in the distance, the shore of the Great Plains. Along the path, I encountered a metal plate, bolted to a boulder. It was headlined “The Mountains Don’t Care.” The sign explained that storms could rise at any moment, and that the paths across Flattop would be hard to follow in a whiteout. Every year, prepared and unprepared hikers die at the whim of the weather and chance.

I made it to the top, and had lunch in the lee of a big rock, out of the wind. I watched other climbers cross a ridge and ascend Hallett Peak (photo). From there, I could see both sides of the Continental Divide. And I could see that the parking lot at Bear Lake was now full. When I got off the trail, there’d be another traffic jam to endure, and on the radio, news of national disarray. The mountains don’t care. Scary, and reassuring at the same time.