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National Parks with Kids
If you’re just starting your national parks journey with kids (especially if you have a 4th grader), get the free Every Kid Outdoors pass. Otherwise, invest in an America the Beautiful Annual Pass. It’s a great value, and you only need to purchase one to cover the entire family. That’s how our national park habit started, and it hasn’t stopped.
We’ve visited 46 national parks so far (we’re still writing them all up), plus dozens of monuments and historic sites. Read about these in our AftT #ParkPics series. Our favorite play is going in winter or the shoulder seasons, when parks like Yellowstone and Rocky Mountain are quiet and snowy. Utah in March is stunning, and it’s just a gorgeous time to visit. While many of the trails may not be open, you’ll still have plenty to do, and the pictures will be something to brag to your friends about.
National parks guide · Updated October 2026
National parks visited
46 of 64
Where it started
Every Kid Outdoors
Hot Tip
Winter in the parks is beautiful – take advantage
Photo series
#ParkPics
Every NPS site
Sorted by state
Take it from us
Our family’s favorite national parks
Ask the four of us for a favorite national park and you’ll get three answers, since Carrie and Carrick both pick Olympic. Here are the ones we love the most (so far!)
Cadence
Redwood
Redwood National and State Parks protect the tallest trees on earth, and the trails through them are flat and shaded, so even little legs can cover some ground. Hike Lady Bird Johnson Grove first thing in the morning.
We drove Howland Hill Road through the Jedediah Smith redwoods on our Oregon trip. Keep an eye out for banana slugs!
Andrew
Glacier
Going-to-the-Sun Road crosses the Continental Divide at Logan Pass, and is one of the quintessential drives in any park. Beyond the road are more than 700 miles of trails, glacier-carved valleys, and lakes in unreal shades of turquoise, and that’s what makes Glacier feel special.
Carrick and Andrew backpacked the Glacier backcountry for 6 days and fell in love. Make time for a hike or two here. You won’t regret it.
Carrie & Carrick
Olympic
Olympic packs glacier-capped mountains, temperate rainforest, and more than 70 miles of wild Pacific coastline into a single park. In one day you can walk under the moss-draped trees of the Hoh Rain Forest and explore the tide pools at Rialto Beach. If you’re lucky like us, you can even get snowed on!
The fact that you can experience all of this within a short drive of each other is kind of crazy. It’s like 3 or 4 parks for the price of one, and it just took Mesa Verde’s top spot for Carrie.
National parks by region
The national parks we’ve visited
These are the parks we’ve written up so far, with more on the way. Tap a photo for the whole visit.
The Rockies and the West7 parks
The desert Southwest10 parks
The heartland and the East7 parks
Islands and the tropics6 parks
AftT #ParkPics
Monuments and historic sites in pictures
These are our short photo tours of the smaller National Park Service sites. Most of them make a great stop on a road trip.
NPS shorthand
- NMNational monument
- NHPNational historical park
- NMEMNational memorial
- NRANational recreation area
Every Kid Outdoors
Free national park passes for fourth graders
Every Kid Outdoors gives fourth graders and their families free entry to national parks and other federal lands for the school year. It’s how a lot of our early park trips got planned. If you have a fourth grader, sign up. Fourth grade teachers can sign up their whole class too.
Every national park
46 national parks down, 18 to go
We’re working our way through all 64. Our national parks map shows every one of them, along with the full list of parks you can filter by state.
Every NPS site, state by state
Here’s every national park, monument, and historic site, sorted by state and territory. Pick a state to see them all.
Alabama Alaska American Samoa Arizona Arkansas California Colorado Connecticut Delaware Florida Georgia Guam Hawaii Idaho Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Kentucky Louisiana Maine Maryland Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Mississippi Missouri Montana Nebraska Nevada New Hampshire New Jersey New Mexico New York North Carolina North Dakota Ohio Oklahoma Oregon Pennsylvania Puerto Rico Rhode Island South Carolina South Dakota Tennessee Texas US Virgin Islands Utah Vermont Virginia Washington Washington, DC West Virginia Wisconsin Wyoming
Need a little more inspiration?
Three park books we like
National Parks of America
By Lonely Planet
Carrick got this one for Christmas and loves it. The photography is gorgeous, and each park gets a few pages of practical tips. Perfect for the coffee table.
Guide to National Parks
By National Geographic
This book has maps, tips, history, and directions to help you plan a visit to any park. Being National Geographic, the photography is incredible.
100 Parks, 5,000 Ideas
By National Geographic
It’s organized by region across the US and Canada, with gorgeous photos on every page. It’s become a go-to for planning our next park. Read our review.
Good to know
Questions families ask us about national parks
It’s a free federal program for fourth graders. The pass gets the student and their family into national parks and other federal lands for the whole school year. A lot of our early park trips were planned around it. Sign up online and print the voucher to bring to the park.
Yes, and it’s our favorite trick for ditching the crowds. We did Rocky Mountain in December with snow on the ground and almost nobody else around, and Yellowstone by snowcoach with bison steaming in the cold. Plan for road closures and short days, and check which visitor centers are open before you go.
Sometimes you can. We saw Haleakalā and Hawaii Volcanoes in one very long day, and all three of Florida’s national parks in a week. It works when the parks are close together or you’re willing to fly between islands. Most parks deserve at least a full day.
Ask the four of us and you’ll get three answers. Cadence’s favorite is Redwood, Andrew’s is Glacier, and Carrie and Carrick both pick Olympic. See why we love them.
Our travel schedule is locked in around school breaks, so we plan around them. On a free weekend we pull out the map and pick a park we can drive to. The bigger parks get spring break or summer, and cash plus miles and points covers the flights.
Keep exploring
Build a trip around a park
Most of our state guides start with a national park. Pick a state and we’ll show you what else is nearby.
