Natural History Of Trail Ridge Road

Constructed from 1929 to 1932 and opened to tourists and drivers the following year, Trail Ridge Road earned immediate inclusion among the scenic wonders of the world. The new path through the park followed the ancient trail across Tombstone Ridge and offered visitors breathtaking views and a privileged glimpse at unique ecosystems. Today, Trail Ridge Road endures as a truly otherworldly place. It is the country s highest continuous paved road, peaking at over twelve thousand feet and running forty-eight miles. Join author Amy Law on a tour across the Continental Divide and through the history of Colorado s most famous byway."

Trail Ridge Road, constructed from 1929-1932, travels through Rocky Mountain National Park and follows the ancient trail across Tombstone Ridge. It offers visitors breathtaking views and a privileged glimpse at unique ecosystems. It is the country's highest continuous paved road, peaking at over twelve thousand feet and running forty-eight miles. Author Amy Law takes the reader on a tour across the Continental Divide and through the history of Colorado's most famous byway.

From an out-of-control wildfire that nearly destroyed a town to a serial spouse killer in Estes Park, It Happened in Rocky Mountain National Park looks at intriguing people and episodes from the history of Colorado’s largest national park. Learn how two teens’ attempt to scale the Diamond—a sheer granite cliff so dangerous that climbing it used to be outlawed—resulted in one of the most complicated rescues in the park’s history. Read about the life and untimely demise of Rocky Mountain Jim, who was badly scarred by a grizzly bear attack and earned a reputation as an eccentric but highly skilled wilderness guide. And meet Harriet Peters, an unusually tenacious girl who summited 14,259-foot-tall Longs Peak at the tender age of eight.

On September 4, 1915, hundreds of people gathered in Estes Park, Colorado, to celebrate the creation of Rocky Mountain National Park. This new nature preserve held the promise of peace, solitude, and rapture that many city dwellers craved. As Jerry Frank demonstrates, however, the park is much more than a lovely place. Rocky Mountain National Park was a keystone in broader efforts to create the National Park Service, and its history tells us a great deal about Colorado, tourism, and ecology in the American West. To Frank, the tensions between tourism and ecology have played out across a natural stage that is anything but passive. At nearly every turn the National Park Service found itself face-to-face with an environment that was difficult to anticipate—and impossible to control. Frank first takes readers back to the late nineteenth century, when Colorado boosters—already touting the Rocky Mountains’ restorative power for lung patients—set out to attract more tourists and generate revenue for the state. He then describes how an ecological perspective came to Rocky in fits and starts, offering a new way of imagining the park that did not sit comfortably with an entrenched management paradigm devoted to visitor recreation and comfort. Frank examines a wide range of popular activities including driving, hiking, skiing, fishing, and wildlife viewing to consider how they have impacted the park’s flora and fauna, often leaving widespread transformation in their wake. He subjects the decisions of park officials to close but evenhanded scrutiny, showing how in their zeal to return the park to what they understood as its natural state, they have tinkered with its features—sometimes with less than desirable results. Today’s Rocky Mountain National Park serves both competing visions, maintaining accessible roads and vistas for the convenience of tourists while guarding its backcountry to preserve ecological values. As the park prepares to celebrate its centennial, Frank’s book advances our understanding of its past while also providing an important touchstone for addressing its problems in the present and future.

As you travel along the Blue Ridge Parkway or Skyline Drive visiting state and national parks or hike the Appalachian Trail, you will encounter an incredible variety of landscapes and one of the most diverse collections of flora and fauna found in temperate forests anywhere in the world. Full of rich detail, this beautifully illustrated, full-color guide to the region was written and designed for ease of use. Whether you're a first time visitor looking to enjoy and gain an understanding of the Parkway's spectacular views or a geology and nature enthusiast, this guide will be an invaluable companion.--

Finally, the total experience of hiking Rocky Mountain National Park has been captured in one comprehensive volume, which covers literally every named destination in RMNP and many exciting hikes in adjacent public lands. This book is a must-have for any beginning hiker or avid outdoor enthusiast. It will take you anywhere you want to go in RMNP and its surrounding areas. From fun family hikes to hearty mountaineering adventures, Rocky Mountain National Park: The Complete Hiking Guide has something for everyone. It includes details about every trail within RMNP, as well as at-your-fingertips info highlighting trailheads, elevation gain, distance, and the difficulty of each hike. By far the most extensive and accurate hiking resource available for RMNP, this guide provides the information you need for an enjoyable experience in one of the nation's most popular parks. Book jacket.

'Think globally, act locally' has become a call to environmentalist mobilization, proposing a closer connection between global concerns, local issues and individual responsibility. A History of Environmentalism explores this dialectic relationship, with ten contributors from a range of disciplines providing a history of environmentalism which frames global themes and narrates local stories. Each of the chapters in this volume addresses specific struggles in the history of environmental movements, for example over national parks, species protection, forests, waste, contamination, nuclear energy and expropriation. A diverse range of environments and environmental actors are covered, including the communities in the Amazonian Forest, the antelope in Tibet, atomic power plants in Europe and oil and politics in the Niger Delta. The chapters demonstrate how these conflicts make visible the intricate connections between local and global, the body and the environment, and power and nature. A History of Environmentalism tells us much about transformations of cultural perceptions and ways of production and consuming, as well as ecological and social changes. More than offering an exhaustive picture of the entire environmentalist movement, A History of Environmentalism highlights the importance of the experience of environmentalism within local communities. It offers a worldwide and polyphonic perspective, making it key reading for students and scholars of global and environmental history and political ecology.