Barring any unforeseen wintry storms, the Going-to-the-Sun Road across the roof of Glacier National Park in Montana has opened for the summer. The road may now be accessed by motorized vehicles all the way through from both the West Glacier and St. Mary entrances. This is the earliest the road has opened since 2005.

Two caves and valuable wildlife habitat could soon be added to Mammoth Cave National Park in Kentucky under legislation calling for nearly 1,000 acres to be added to the national park.

In Tennessee, Great Smokey Mountains National Park harbors a one-way road in bucolic Cades Cove. Its 11-mile paved loop is loaded with scenery, historical sites, and wildlife. But we’d heard about the cove’s famed car jams due to around two million annual visitors: lines of vehicles inching slowly along the road and parking lot congestion that prevented stopping at sites. Clearly, the car approach did not appeal to my sister or me!

Florida’s national parks are a critical component of the statewide effort to restore the Everglades after draining and ditching nearly destroyed this ecosystem in the 20th century. In May, Audubon Florida staff celebrated the ribbon cutting for the Taylor Slough Improvement Project just four months after standing in the same spot with shovels to kickstart the initiative’s groundbreaking.