As we cruise over the liquid border from Canada into the United States, the captain of the M.V. International slows down so we can see the hint of two stone boundary markers in a narrow patch of razed forest along Upper Waterton Lake.

Just five years after an Interior Department investigation determined then-Gettysburg National Military Park Superintendent Ed Clark had "committed criminal violations by submitting false travel vouchers and by accepting more than $23,000 in meals, lodging, and other in-kind gifts from non-Government organizations," he has been appointed superintendent of the Appalachian National Scenic Trail.

Some lodging prices in Yellowstone National Park are effectively blocking a wide segment of Americans, whose tax dollars help pay for the National Park System out of experiencing a night or two in the park's iconic lodges.

Five aged and weakened magnolia trees at Hot Springs National Park in Arkansas are being replaced with younger, healthier trees.