Our National Parks

We have two National Parks near Carlsbad, the Carlsbad Caverns National Park and Guadalupe Mountains National Park. They are both beautiful and deserve to be protected and preserved. The photograph on the left is, of course, the Big Room underground in Carlsbad Caverns. The photograph on the right is the trail up McKitrick Canyon. This is one of the most beautiful hiking choices in the area this time of year. It is a truely unique ecosystem here in the desert. Take a bottle of water and wear decent hiking shoes. It is not a difficult hike, most enjoyable.

There was a letter to the editor of the Current Argus today concerning OUR parks that was a bit disturbing. It seems OUR national parks are under attack by the Department of Interior. There is proposed legislation that could conceivably open the parks to mining interests. I decided to do a little research before I blasted anyone. And I found the letter was true, but only part of the picture. We do need to be concerned; taking our parks for granted would be a terrible thing.

And since this is a topic I would not attempt to pretend to know enough about to try to correct, I will link you to Kurt Repanshek, the author of National Parks for Dummies, and his blog/column Traveling the National Parks. He explains the problem much better than I ever could.

I do agree with Hal Waters in his plea to let our national leaders know that we value our parks and the people who serve and protect these valuable resources for future generations. So hit your keyboards people, let those guys in Washington know they can't mess with OUR parks.