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Most of us like to take road trips, whether it’s in a big luxury motorhome or travel trailer, or just in our daily driver pickup or car. But most people don’t take planning a road trip as serious as this! Well, leave it to an engineer. This map was made by Randy Olson, a computer science and engineering phd at Michigan State. It’s not his first big organized map, but it’s a good one for anyone who likes national parks!
In all 48 states on the continent, there are national parks, and this map provides an itinerary for road trippers to see each of those parks, including:
Grand Canyon National Park, Arizona
Petrified Forest National Park, Arizona
Saguaro National Park, Arizona
Guadalupe Mountains National Park, Texas
Carlsbad Caverns National Park, New Mexico
Big Bend National Park, Texas
Hot Springs National Park, Arkansas
Mammoth Cave National Park, Kentucky
Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Tennessee
Everglades National Park, Florida
Dry Tortugas National Park, Florida
Biscayne National Park, Florida
Congaree National Park, South Carolina
Shenandoah National Park, Virginia
Acadia National Park, Maine
Cuyahoga Valley National Park, Ohio
Isle Royale National Park, Michigan
Voyageurs National Park, Minnesota
Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota
Badlands National Park, South Dakota
Wind Cave National Park, South Dakota
Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado
Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve, Colorado
Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, Colorado
Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado
Canyonlands National Park, Utah
Arches National Park, Utah
Capitol Reef National Park, Utah
Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah
Zion National Park, Utah
Great Basin National Park, Nevada
Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming
Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming
Glacier National Park, Montana
North Cascades National Park, Washington
Mount Rainier National Park, Washington
Olympic National Park, Washington
Crater Lake National Park, Oregon
Redwood National and State Parks, California
Lassen Volcanic National Park, California
Yosemite National Park, California
Kings Canyon National Park, California
Sequoia National Park, California
Pinnacles National Park, California
Channel Islands National Park, California
Joshua Tree National Park, California
Death Valley National Park, California
This trip is NOT for the faint of heart. It’s 14,498 miles long! That’s quite a few times the width of North America at any point. In order to see every park, you’d have to go super fast for 2 months, but that doesn’t mean that sections of the map couldn’t be done by people in their own local area!
