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Reader Participation Day: Where Are the Best Waterfalls In the National Park System?

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Published Date

March 3, 2010
Waterfall Ohe o Gorge, Haleakala National Park, copyright Q.T. Luong

Where's your favorite waterfall in the National Park System? Is it this one, a waterfall in Ohe o gorge in Haleakala National Park? Photo copyright by Q.T. Luong, used with permission. www.terragalleria.com/parks

Two of the most incredible waterfalls in the National Park System can be found in Yellowstone National Park. But it certainly doesn't have a monopoly on waterworks. Olympic National Park boasts the beautifully secluded Marymere Falls, Glacier National Park the towering Bird Woman Falls, and Great Smoky Mountains National Park the comparatively small but gorgeous-just-the-same Abrams Falls.

What other waterfalls in the park system deserve to be singled out for their beauty? No doubt there are thousands to choose from. Nevada and Vernal falls in Yosemite National Park (not to mention that big one, Yosemite Fall), in Sequoia there's Tokopah Falls, and even Acadia National Park has some beauties, such as the 40-foot cascade known as Hadlock Brook Waterfall.

Shenandoah National Park is cut with waterfalls, one of which, Overall Run, plunges 93 feet. Even Arches National Park, that red-rock gem that's normally talc dry, has some spectacular waterfalls ... that result from torrential downpours and quickly vanish.

So, where would you begin in building a list of the top 100 waterfalls in the National Park System?

Comments

I love the Jacks river falls in the cahutta wilderness on the Ga Tn line. It's a cool hike with about 38 to 40 river crossing to get there. But it's worth it just to see it. You use to be able to camp out there on the falls but now they won't let you due to the bears. But still have lots of great spots to set up the Eno and relax. I'm planning a trip there in the beginning of October hope it's not to cold.


Yosetmite Falls.  I had a transcendent experience on a May night with the falls raging with snow melt.  The valley below was bathed in the light of a full moon.  I'll never forget it.


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