With year-end right around the corner, I’ve been spending time looking back across the National Parks Traveler’s stories from 2023 to compile ourtop stories of the year – those that demonstrate the Traveler’s reach, impact, and close coverage of breaking news.

In an open-air barn in Texas Hill Country, a bull named Domino and a cow named Miss Battle patiently tolerate visitors transfixed by the fact the initials “LBJ” are branded on their right horns. Only their offspring, an unnamed calf born Sept. 23 and so far identified as 635, plays hard to get and dozes in the back of a stall.

In his collection of essays and poems published in 1920 titled “Darkwater,” W.E.B. Du Bois wrote about his poignant encounter with the beauty of the Grand Canyon, the stupendous chasm in Arizona.

A breakthrough in the fight to save whitebark pines has been reached through the sequencing of the species' genome, a milestone scientists say could help the high-altitude tree endure environmental challenges.