It’s always a bummer when your vacation doesn’t go as planned. Still, a spoiled trip isn’t often cause for legal action. But for Christopher Bisaillon, a guest at Park City Mountain Resort in Utah over the holidays—where operations were disrupted as a result of the ski patrol union strike—the distance was just too great between the vacation he’d planned and the experience he had.

According to Bisaillon’s class action filed by the Jackson, Wyoming-based Spence Law Firm against Park City’s parent company, Vail Resorts, Inc.: “Plaintiff spent in excess of $15,000 for his family of five to have Vail Resort’s publicized ‘ski experience of a lifetime’ over the holidays. It turned out to be a colossal disaster with the family only being able to ski less than ten runs over the duration of their week-long, Christmas family vacation.”

The suit doesn’t just apply to Bisaillon. It also includes everyone who bought lift tickets between December 27, 2024, and January 7, 2025, and asks for damages of an undetermined amount that would likely exceed $5 million. The suit alleges that Vail Resorts failed to adequately notify guests of the strike’s impact, and says the company also failed to deliver on the advertised value of the lift tickets Bisaillon and others purchased.

Ski vacations come with a notoriously steep price tag, and Park City is no exception. Over the holidays, a single-day adult lift ticket cost $289, according to the court filing. Including travel, lodging, equipment rentals, dining, and lift tickets, the lawsuit estimates that a family can spend between $10,000 and $20,000 for a week-long trip.

Bisaillon, who is based in Illinois, arrived with his family at Park City Mountain Resort on December 28, 2024, one day after the ski patrol union of their locker room to form a picket line. The family planned to ski for the week, but were confounded by hours-long lift lines and little open terrain. The lawsuit alleges just 16 percent of the mountain was accessible.

An NBC News that aired on January 6 said that only 25 of the resort’s 41 lifts were operating. In the same segment, which is also quoted in the lawsuit, another skier named Peter Nystrom tells NBC, “You kind of had to laugh about it. Like, we’re here in one of the best mountains in the country, waiting three hours in line.”

The strike was the latest development in a years-long negotiation between the patroller’s union and corporate leadership, with the patrollers asking for higher wages and better working conditions. On December 14, 2024, the patrollers’ union voted to authorize a strike, and on December 16 informed the National Labor Relations Board that they felt Vail Resorts was negotiating in bad faith.

Vail Resorts said the same of the union’s conduct, with Park City’s vice president Dierdre Walsh telling the Salt Lake Tribune on December 16 that they were “deeply disappointed” union leaders “refus[ed] to negotiate in good faith or discuss mediation.”

The suit claims that Vail Resorts could reasonably have been expected to know a strike was imminent and warn guests of that possibility in advance on December 16. Instead, many guests—like Bisaillon—arrived at the resort without knowledge of the impending strike.

The patroller negotiations, and the possible walkout, were covered in local and national media outlets at the time. However, the suit says that Bisaillon and other guests weren’t alerted by Vail Resorts. It also alleges that the Park City resort’s website, where guests can buy lift tickets in advance of their visit, didn’t post an update referencing the strike’s impact on visitor experience until January 4, a week after the strike began.

Vail Resorts declined to comment to șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű about the lawsuit for this article, and Spence Law Firm did not respond to requests for comment before publication.

“It’s business, it’s complicated. […] But at the end of the day, no visitor cares about that,”Ìę New Yorker Greg Moonves told a Utah NPR , KPCW, on December 30. He was visiting Park City with his family for a five-day ski trip. “We spent a lot of money to come here, as did everyone else, to have a good time skiing with our families. And at the end of the day, they’re not providing the product that they claim they’re providing.”

If a Utah judge determines that the suit fits the parameters for a class action lawsuit, it will continue through the state legal system. Vail Resorts will have the opportunity to settle with the plaintiffs outside of court, or the two parties can proceed to a trial.

Meanwhile, the strike ended on January 7, when the patrol union and Vail announced that they had reached a tentative agreement that “addresses both party’s interests.” One official that the benefits secured by the union, including increased base pay, might be extended to unionized patrollers at other Vail locations.

And on Thursday, January 16, Vail Resorts that they will offer everyone who skied and snowboarded at Park City during the ski patrol strike credit towards passes for the 2025/26 season, the exact amount of which would depend on how many days they had skied.

“We deeply value the trust and loyalty of our guests, and while Park City Mountain was open during the patrol strike, it was not the experience we wanted to provide,” Vail Resort’s COO Dierdra Walsh wrote in a statement. “We are committed to rebuilding the trust and loyalty of our guests by delivering an exceptional experience at Park City Mountain this season and in the future.”

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It’s a great year for planet-watching. In addition to this week’s stellar views of Mars, stargazers can admire multiple “planet parades”—the simultaneous appearance of several planets in the night sky—in 2025. Arguably the best parade of the year commences on January 18, with Venus and Saturn appearing within 2.2 degrees, or roughly two pinky-widths, of each other. The parade will continue into mid-February, with two additional planet gatherings to follow later in 2025.

Planet parades “aren’t super rare,” according to , “but they don’t happen every year” either.

Here’s how to make the most of 2025’s celestial shows.

How to View a Planet Parade

First, let’s talk planet-watching basics. You can generally see Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and Mercury with the naked eye. Uranus is sometimes naked-eye visible, but only under the darkest skies. Neptune is too small and dim for us to see unaided. A telescope can significantly enhance your view; if you don’t have one, check out the public stargazing nights at your .

I use the stargazing app ($12.99 for the “plus” version) to navigate the night sky. And another astro hack: You can tell the difference between a planet and a star because the former glows steadily while the latter flickers. Some planets, like Mars, even have a noticeably pale-orange tinge.

The great thing about viewing planets is you don’t have to travel far. Unlike fainter interstellar sights such as the northern lights, the brightest planets are visible even in light-polluted cities. That means you could catch this year’s planet parades by stargazing from your own backyard.

Here are dates of the year’s major planet parades, with tips on where and when to look, plus recommendations for a handful of national parks with surreal cosmic views.

The Best Times to See the Planet ParadeÌę

Technically, this month’s planet parade is already on show. Six planets—Venus, Saturn, Neptune, Uranus, Jupiter, and Mars—have been visible up in the sky throughout January. The parade will continue into mid-February. That said, peak observing begins this weekend, as Venus and Saturn will appear exceptionally close in the southwest sky soon after sunset on January 18, according to .

On January 21, Jupiter and Venus will become even more radiant as they climb high in the evening sky with the moon staying below the horizon until after midnight. The lack of lunar light will make it easier to spot the planets and see more stars.

Another highlight of the year’s first planet parade: after sunset on February 1, Venus and the crescent moon will appear close together in the southwest sky for several hours before plummeting beneath the western horizon.

This month’s spectacle will be visible each night, weather permitting, from mid-January to mid-February between sunset and 9 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. local time. You can use a stargazing app to determine exact timing for your location.

More 2025 Planet Parades to Watch for

Late February

January’s interstellar gathering will be the easiest to watch—and therefore the one not to miss this year—but a late-February parade, which will be best viewed around February 28, introduces a new twist. Mercury will join the party, creating a rare gathering of all seven of our neighboring planets in the sky at once.

But the late-February viewing will be much trickier than this week. At the end of February, all planets technically will be up at the same time at dusk, but Saturn will set soon after the sun does. It will also largely get washed out by the sun’s glow, which illuminates the western horizon for up to 90 minutes after sunset. Given its close distance to the sun, Neptune, which will hang near Saturn, will also be close to impossible to spot, even through a telescope.

To see this late-February planet parade, watch the western horizon right after sunset on February 28. That’s when Mercury is most visible, with the luminous planet Venus above it. Jupiter, Mars, and Uranus will be high in the south-southeast sky that night, too.

Mid-August

After February, we’ll have a lull in major planet gatherings until mid-August, when Jupiter, Venus, Uranus, Saturn, Neptune, and Mercury will simultaneously parade in the pre-dawn sky. Mercury will reach its farthest distance from the sun—the period when it’s most visible—from August 19 to 20. Look for it in the pre-dawn sky on August 20.

Mercury will rise over the east horizon, with Venus, Jupiter, and the crescent moon nearly aligned over it. Saturn and Neptune will also be close together, above the western horizon, with Uranus overhead.

Best Places to View the 2025 Planet Parades

Video of skywatching in Loreto, Mexico, on January 12 by Stephanie Vermillion. This timelapse has views of Venus, which is very bright and distinguishable, and Saturn just above it and harder to distinguish from stars. The video was taken the day before the full moon, so its bright glow is washing out most stars.Ìę

The planets will be spread across the sky for most of 2025’s planet parades, meaning they will not be in a straight line, but appear from east to west. For best viewing, seek a wide-open vista with minimal obstructions to the horizon; a hilltop or large field would work well. Again, since the brightest planets can be seen even in cities, you don’t have to travel to see them.

If you want to take your observation to the next level, however, these five national parks offer stargazing events and wide-open viewing areas for enjoying the show. See more locations and tips on what to bring here.

SOUTH: Everglades National Park

Spot the planets from the highest viewing deck in Florida’s Everglades National Park. The park’s 70-foot Shark Valley Observation Tower overlooks up to 20 miles of the Everglades, with open 360-degree vistas. The tower stays open 24 hours a day.

The safest way to visit this gator-country attraction at night is via the park’s free ranger-led , which runs January 13, 19, 21, and February 4, 5, 18, 19, 26, and 27.

SOUTHWEST: Canyonlands National Park

Grand View Point in Canyonlands National Park made our list of best scenic viewpoints for a reason. This perch looks out upon a sweeping panorama of water-carved sandstone, and, as a Dark Sky-certified park, Canyonlands remains open 24 hours a day. The lookout lies at the southern end of Island in the Sky drive, just off the road on a paved path, with a second perch a one-mile trail away. Be careful in the winter; it can get icy. from $30 per private vehicle

WEST: Death Valley National Park

Death Valley National Park is one of the best places in the country for stargazing and planet-watching, with lookouts open 24 hours like the panoramic promising sparkly nightscapes above. Add to your astronomical awe by attending one of several night-sky events: a free on January 18 or 25, a with telescopes on January 24, or the park’s from February 21 to 23. from $15

EAST: New River Gorge National Park

In the eastern U.S., try the New River Gorge, which is also open around the clock. The recommends a handful of stargazing spots, including the New River Gorge Bridge Overlook at the Canyon Rim Visitor Center, or take the Sandstone Falls Boardwalk, among other options. The main overlook at the Grandview Visitor Center is especially promising in winter, with minimal overhead foliage and expansive vistas. The park is free to enter.

MIDWEST: Theodore Roosevelt National Park

in North Dakota has all the conditions for picturesque planet-gazing: wide-open views, awestriking scenery, and minimal light pollution. The park, again open throughout the night, includes several starry-sky viewpoints. Try Riverbend Overlook to watch the constellations and planets float above the Missouri River, or hit up Painted Canyon Visitor Center to marvel at the shimmery nightscapes above the badlands. While you’re here, keep an eye to the north—when conditions align, this is a great national park to spot the northern lights.

Stephanie Vermillion is șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű’s astrotourism columnist. Recent articles for șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű include this account of her three top nighttime adventures, an excerpt from her new book, 100 Nights of a Lifetime: The World’s Ultimate șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍűs After Dark; the scoop on where to find the darkest skies in North America for aurora hunting and stargazing; and nine places to see the most dazzling northern lights in decades. She is based in Cleveland.

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Keep your eyes on Mars in our night sky this week. Our neighboring planet—the fourth from the sun in our solar system and approximately half the size of Earth—will look larger and brighter in our heavens than it has for the past two years, particularly Wednesday night. That’s when Earth will pass directly between Mars and the sun, putting us within 60 million miles of the Red Planet, roughly 42 percent closer than average.

Astronomers call this phenomenon opposition, and it affords prime sky-watching conditions. During opposition, a planet is closer to Earth, and we benefit from seeing the celestial body with the sun’s full glare, which makes it appear exceptionally vivid.

While we can enjoy the opposition of distant planets like Jupiter and Saturn almost every year, Mars is only in opposition once every 27 months because our orbits are closer, according to . And this week marks its long-awaited moment in the sun.

Here’s when and how to best observe Mars during opposition. It won’t be this radiant again for us until 2027.

The Best Nights to View Mars During Opposition

Mars technically reaches opposition between January 15 to 16, but even now it’s already more luminous than usual. If you go outside tonight—or any night until Wednesday—the Red Planet will look spectacular and only get brighter as we near opposition.

Here’s a video of Mars next to the moon during the 2022 opposition, as viewed via a Nikon P1000 camera:

On January 13, we’ll see another interesting Martian sight: , which occurs when this month’s full Wolf Moon slides in front of Mars. According to , this will begin over the contiguous U.S. at 8:45 P.M. EST and will be visible to the naked eye above most of North America. (Exact timing and duration will vary by location.)

Throughout opposition week, if the sky is clear in your location, Mars will shine as vividly as Sirius, the night sky’s brightest star. But if you can only stay up late one night, I recommend the January 15 opposition, when the planet will be more dazzling to us on Earth than any time since December 2022.

Where to Spot Mars in the Sky During Opposition Week

Mars will rise in the east at dusk and set above the western horizon around sunrise. Seek out the planet’s tangerine tinge in the Gemini constellation (the hue will become bolder closer to opposition). Peak viewing begins around midnight, when Mars is highest in the sky.

Even in light-polluted cities, Mars is visible to the naked eye. I shot the following photo on January 7 while I was in San Diego, and visibility was still quite remarkable.

That said, a pair of binoculars—or better yet a telescope—will show off the planet’s surface details, including a vast canyon system and Olympus Mons, a volcano three times as high as Mount Everest.

If you’re new to planet-watching, download a stargazing app to navigate the heavens and to locate other prominent nearby celestial sights, like Jupiter and Sirius.

Regional Astronomy Events Celebrating Mars That Are Worth Traveling To

Consider attending a community astronomy night, where night-sky experts will show you the stars and planets via telescope. I found a half dozen excellent stargazing events across the country that will focus on the Mars opposition this week, but it’s always worth reaching out to your to see if it’s hosting any get-togethers for planet-gazing, too. (Note: all events below are weather permitting.)

The East

Chester, Pennsylvania

The astronomy and physics faculty at Widener University, just south of Philadelphia, are running a public at its observatory starting at 7 P.M. on January 15. . As of publication, this event is at full capacity, but you can join the waitlist. Free

The South

Conway, Arkansas

At 6 P.M. on January 15, the , located north of Little Rock, will open its observatory to the public for night-sky observations through a powerful Meade 14-inch-aperture LX200R telescope. Free

The Midwest

Jeff Davis County, Texas

The McDonald Observatory, located in West Texas but part of the University of Texas at Austin, will host a star party at 7 P.M. on January 14. Come for the amphitheater tour and stay for the telescope viewing. is required. From $25

Kenosha, Wisconsin

Heide Observatory’s aligns perfectly with the Mars opposition. The January 15 event begins at 6 P.M. at the Hawthorn Hollow Nature Sanctuary and Arboretum. Guides will lead guests through a tour of the night sky via laser pointer. $12

The West

Divide, Colorado

The Colorado Springs Astronomical Society is hosting a at Mueller State Park, 33 miles west of Colorado Springs, starting at 7 P.M on January 17. The event will take place at the park’s visitor center; no registration is required, but you will need a (from $10).

Sunriver, Oregon

The , roughly 20 miles south of Bend, is giving the public a prime view of Mars on January 15 starting at 7 P.M. The observatory has one of the largest collections of publicly accessible telescopes in the country, with staff astronomers at the ready to help visitors learn to use them. Registration is required. $28 for nonmembers; free for members

Stephanie Vermillion is șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online’s astrotourism columnist. She’s the author of the new National Geographic book, , and she plans to watch Mars’s opposition on a stargazing getaway to Loreto, Mexico.

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On Tuesday, January 7, President Biden announced the formation of two new national monuments in California: the Chuckwalla and SĂĄttĂ­tla Highlands. The new monuments encompass a combined 848,000 acres of land, and cover areas that are culturally and historically significant to several Indigenous groups.

According to by the Biden administration, the two national monuments will “protect clean water for communities, honor areas of cultural significance to Tribal Nations and Indigenous peoples, and enhance access to nature.”

The designation protects the land from new oil and gas drilling and other development. It also preserves outdoor recreation access and ecologically important landscapes. Both areas preserve the culturally and historically significant ancestral homelands of numerous Indigenous tribes.

“Today’s designation of Chuckwalla National Monument and SĂĄttĂ­tla National Monument is a win for the California outdoor recreation community,” Katie Hawkins, the California program director at the nonprofit Outdoor Alliance, said in a statement. “These monuments safeguard sites of sacred, cultural, and historic significance; protect critical biodiversity and habitat; and expand outdoor recreation access for current and future generations to these special places.”

The 624,000-acre Chuckwalla National Monument is situated at the convergence of the Colorado and Mojave deserts, south of Joshua Tree National Park and extending into the Coachella Valley to the west. The area, which will be overseen by the Bureau of Land Management, has been a popular destination for outdoor recreation even before receiving national monument status. It features hiking, climbing, and camping at places like the Painted Canyon and Box Canyon in Mecca Hills, Corn Springs Campground, and the Bradshaw Trail.

The new monument also extends the Mojave to Moab Conservation Corridor, a roughly 600-mile stretch of protected public land that extends from Colorado to California and is the largest protected habitat corridor in the continental U.S. According to the administration’s press release, more than 50 rare or threatened species live within the Chuckwalla monument’s borders, including the Chuckwalla lizard from which the monument draws its name. It also safeguards a stretch of the critical Colorado River watershed, which flows through the newly protected area.

“The protection of the Chuckwalla National Monument brings the Quechan people an overwhelming sense of peace and joy,” the Fort Yuma Quechan Tribe, who have been calling on the Biden administration to designate the monument, said in to the Washington Post. “Tribes being reunited as stewards of this landscape is only the beginning of much-needed healing and restoration, and we are eager to fully rebuild our relationship to this place.”

The Quechans, along with other indigenous communities advocating for a monument, have also called for a co-management structure that includes federal officials and tribal leadership, similar to the one in place at Bears Ears National Monument.

The SĂĄttĂ­tla Highlands National Monument encompasses 224,000 acres stretching across parts of the Klamath, Modoc, Shasta-Trinity National Forests in northern California. It will be managed by the Forest Service.

North and east of Mount Shasta, the new monument encompasses the Medicine Lake Highlands, including the sacred ancestral homelands of the Pit River Tribe and Modoc peoples. It also features ample recreation opportunities, with trails for hiking, biking, camping, and mountaineering. At the heart of the monument is 7,921-foot Medicine Lake Volcano, a large dormant volcano, as well as Medicine Lake. The area is habitat for dozens of vulnerable plants and animals, and covers massive underwater aquifers that local communities rely on.

The announcement of the new monuments comes the day after the Biden administration along the Atlantic coast, part of the Gulf of Mexico, the Pacific coast in the lower 48, and parts of the Bering Sea in Alaska. In 2024, the president designated two other national monuments in California, San Gabriel Mountains and Barryessa Snow Mountain National Monument.

Over the course of his presidency, Biden has established, expanded, or restored 15 national monuments and several , conserving a total of 670 million acres of U.S. lands and waters. The administration has consistently engaged tribal partners, prioritizing their input when selecting and managing protected areas.

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Paige McClanahan, a journalist and travel writer, is much too diplomatic to phrase it this way, so allow me to be the grump: you’re the reason locals so often dislike tourists.

“Travel has become a consumerist exercise where the goal is to get our money’s worth out of a place,” McClanahan says in a phone interview from her home in France. “We need to wake up. Paris owes you nothing.”

The tourist-local tension has been around since before Marco Polo, but in her debut book, , McClanahan shows us just how bad things have gotten. Globally, travelers will log some 1.5 billion trips abroad by the end of 2024—the largest movement of people the planet has ever seen. In a handful of years, that number could reach 1.8 billion. Closer to home, Americans are on track to take almost two billion domestic leisure trips annually by 2025. Despite the buzz around mindful experiences and sustainable travel, locals from Athens to Zermatt have had enough of us. Some Hawaiians have requested that we stay home. Romans fine tourists up to $280 for clogging the Spanish Steps. In July, an annoyed mob roamed Barcelona’s boulevards dousing visitors with squirt guns.

McClanahan, who writes for The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Guardian, has plugged her journalistic pen into this bursting dike with empathy, not by shaming or lecturing anyone. Nor does she ask people to stay put, which would be detrimental to conservation work, prosperity, and cultural bridge building. Instead, McClanahan uses the voices of locals adversely affected by tourism to inspire us to travel with more curiosity, humility, and appreciation for how our holiday can be hell on the climate and local residents. Above all, she wants us to know that we have the power to make travel a force for good.

This elevated mindset is the hallmark of the new tourist. Becoming one isn’t hard. It means visiting Iceland in the off-season or trading the line at the Louvre for a Paris Noir walking tour to soak up the city’s Black history. You can control your partying in Amsterdam and stay behind the fence at the Grand Canyon. You can insist on supporting local guides and locally owned hotels, restaurants, and food carts. (The Barcelona mob targeted people eating at a Taco Bell, among other spots.)

“Even if you’re a low-budget traveler, you can still be a high-value visitor,” McClanahan says.

McClanahan, who left the United States at age 26 and has spent the past 17 years writing from Africa and Europe, admits that she has made plenty of old-tourist mistakes—like posting a self-serving Instagram reel from Angkor Wat that barely showed Angkor Wat. “I live in a glass house,” she says.

McClanahan casts no aspersions on the types of trips you like but does bristle at people who consider themselves “travelers” and not tourists. “I don’t deny that people travel for a huge range of reasons, some higher-minded than others,” she writes in The New Tourist. “So, sure, call yourself a traveler but never forget you’re a tourist, too.” What matters is that we make informed decisions on how to travel in ways that put places and the people who live there first.

“One of the most constructive things we can do in our flickering moment of life is to embrace the chance to leave our comfort zones—those dangerous lairs where we learn to languish,” she writes. She adds to me: “None of us can wave a magic wand and change the behavior of millions of other people, but each of us can be that change.”

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If it weren’t for travel, Margie Goldsmith, age 80, says she would have died at least three times by now. Ten years ago, the globe-trotting author and travel writer endured a risky surgery for pancreatic cancer. Two years later, the cancer returned. A few years after that, Goldsmith was diagnosed with lung cancer. She survived it all, she is sure, because she’s been a world traveler for 50 years.

You’ll be forgiven if you’re a little skeptical. After all, globetrotting isn’t often a prescription for the ill or infirm. But recent research suggests that travel and tourism could have powerful impacts on your health and even longevity.

How Travel Helps to Slow Aging

According to a this fall by Fengli Hu, a PhD candidate at Edith Cowen University in Perth, Australia, travel could be a powerful tool for slowing down the aging process. Hu’s main theory is fairly straightforward: Many of the lifestyle practices medical and mental-health experts endorse—like social engagement, appreciating nature, walking, and learning new things—are intrinsic to travel.

But the novelty of Hu’s research is that it creates a foundation for thinking about travel in terms of entropy. Travel, she writes, is a way to maintain a “low-entropy state”—in other words, a state of optimal health and efficient bodily function. Since she published the paper, dozens of media outlets have covered her work.

In a video call with șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű, Hu says she didn’t expect so much attention, especially given that the research is only theoretical at this point. She’s just begun to set up the related experiments, which will be completed in 2025. But the interest makes sense.

She says, “Many people are looking for a way to keep young and healthy, and travel can be a cost-effective way to improve their physical and mental health and slow down the aging process.” It’s cost effective, she says, because folks don’t necessarily have to travel to pricey, far-flung locations to experience the benefits.

The theory of entropy comes from physics; it refers to the natural tendency of systems to move from a state of organization and order to one of chaos and disorder. Entropy has also been used as a framework for thinking about aging and disease. When you’re young and healthy, your internal systems run smoothly. That’s order. As you age, cellular mutations and dysfunctions proliferate. That’s disorder—a high-entropy state.

Entropy almost always moves in one direction, Hu says, “but can be mitigated or slowed down with certain measures.” Being a tourist, she says, may be one.

Travel—that is, relaxing, leisure-focused travel—has the power to reduce stress, it encourages exercise, and it forces you to meet and socialize with new people. All of that keeps you sharp and optimizes your body’s performance and efficiency. As a result, Hu says, it could help you stave off physical and mental decline and potentially live longer.

How Travel Relieves Stress

Goldsmith started traveling when she was 32, in the wake of a nasty divorce. She needed something to pull her out of depression, and she’d always wanted to go to the Galapagos. So, she went.

“They say you can move a muscle, change a thought,” Goldsmith says. “Well, it turns out you can also move your location and change a thought.”

The change was exhilarating. Since then, Goldsmith has traveled to 149 countries. Travel has made her a more generous, compassionate person, she says. It’s also made her more resilient.

“I look at people my age, and they look like my grandmother,” she says. “They’re bent over with arthritis and they’re not moving. That will never be me. Travel gives you a more active life, a bigger life. It will keep you young.”

So far, experimental studies seem to support both Goldsmith’s experience and Hu’s research. One of the best-known is the Helsinki Businessman Study, a 50-year experiment involving more than 1,200 Finnish participants who filled out lifestyle and habit questionnaires between the 1960s and 2010s. In a , Timo Strandberg, MD, PhD, found a strong correlation between vacation time and longevity.

Participants in the intervention group—600-plus men who were given a strict health-and-nutrition regimen during the early years of the study—had a 37 percent higher chance of dying before their mid-70s, if they took fewer than three weeks of vacation per year. Those who took more than three weeks of vacation per year lived longer. Why?

“These men who had less vacation were more psychologically vulnerable to stress,” Strandberg said in a video call with șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű. That stress included participants’ family and work obligations, as well as the added pressure to stick to a structured health-and-fitness regime. Taking more vacation seemed to benefit participants in the intervention group, likely by keeping their stress in check, Strandberg says.

Surprisingly, the amount of vacation time participants took seemed to have no correlation to longevity in the control group—those who weren’t given a health and fitness routine to stick to. The upshot? Giving yourself extra rules and routines can be stressful, no matter the intention. And the more stress, obligations, and prescribed regimens you have in your life, the more critical vacations may be. (Fitness fanatics, we’re looking at you.)

The Case for More Frequent VacationsÌę

Stress of any kind can have cumulative negative effects.

“One theory is that your acute stress—which can be good and healthy and help you avoid danger and so on—can turn into chronic stress,” Strandberg said. “Then that will show up in biological terms and in different markers in the body.” A vacation has the potential to act as a reset, chipping away at your total stress load and bringing it back down to healthy levels.

Strandberg adds that while the health benefits of a vacation include stress relief and lower cortisol levels, the effects are only temporary. As a result, he recommends taking several four- to five-day vacations throughout the year rather than a single three-week vacation. That way you’re continually keeping your stress in check rather than saving it all up for a single blow-out.

Kiki Keating, a travel curator and trip guide based in New Hampshire, is a firm believer in frequent travel. Keating, who identifies as “a very young 62,” just hiked 90 miles along the Portuguese coast and has a handful of other trips—including an overseas tour she does every year with her 86-year-old mother—on the docket for the coming year. The travel keeps both active, and it gives them something to look forward to. That sense of purpose, she says, is key to both living long and facing setbacks with determination. She’s watched many people use an upcoming trip as a life ring to pull out of depression or weather an injury or illness.

Goldsmith is one. Her first pancreatic surgery was extremely dangerous, a six-hour operation that only 25 percent of patients survive. But she felt she would make it; she had places yet to see.

As she recovered, dreams of travel motivated her to keep moving. “As soon as I got out of the hospital, the first thing I did was travel,” she says. Likewise, when facing a knee-replacement surgery earlier this year, she booked trips to Ireland and Scottsdale to give her something to look forward to—and motivate her to do everything she could to recover faster.

Travel Keeps Your Mind Sharp

But you don’t have to be in advanced years to benefit from frequent travel. Keating has also seen it impact how her adult children face challenges and deal with stress.

“Travel helps you to be more relaxed when you’re adapting to something new,” Keating says. “When you go to a place with a new culture and a language you don’t speak, it can feel hard at first. Then, after a day or two you’re like, ‘Oh, I take this metro and follow this red line and go to the blue line, and I know how to say hello, and this is where I like to eat.’ You remind yourself you can learn new things and adapt, and that gives you confidence.” Today, she says, her kids—all of whom traveled with her when they were younger—are good at taking adversity in stride. That’s a tool they’ll use for the rest of their lives to minimize stress, and it could pay big dividends in terms of wellness.

It’s not just about stress, either. A small 2018 study by Craig Anderson, a UC Berkeley postdoctoral fellow, shows that experiencing awe can help . Other research, including a that followed more than 6,700 older adults, indicates that travel could also ameliorate cognitive decline. Mental stimulation—including learning new languages and visiting museums—has been shown to help by up to 47 percent.

It wouldn’t be much of a stretch to say that challenging yourself to navigate a new place or learn new customs would have some of the same benefits.

“Travel is sort of like riding your mountain bike on a technical trail,” says Stephanie Pearson, 54, a professional travel writer who’s been globetrotting for more than 30 years. “You have to be in a similar flow space to navigate foreign languages, customs, and travel logistics. So I really think it does something cognitively to your brain. It also helps you reset and focus and see the world in a different way.”

Pearson adds that she’s felt a similar level of focus and challenge on trips near home as to far-flung places like Bhutan and New Zealand. As long as there’s an element of awe, discovery, and getting out of your comfort zone, she says, your mind and body stand to benefit.

“You don’t have to fling yourself across the world to have an awesome adventure. You can drive to a nearby park or city that you’ve never visited and have a rewarding experience,” Pearson says. “The benefit lies in having that curiosity.”

Corey Buhay is a freelance writer and editor based in Boulder, Colorado. She is a member of the U.S. Ice Climbing Team, which takes her to Korea, Switzerland, Czech, and Slovakia each winter. She dreams of one day being able to travel when the weather is actually warm. Her recent stories for șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű range from mountaineering bromance, with “After 50 Years of Friendship, These Alpinists Just Bagged (Another) Unclimbed Peak,” to trail-running records in “Forget Pumpkin Spice Lattes, It’s FKT Season,” to loss in the mountains, with “Years After My Mentor Died in the Backcountry, I Retraced His Final Footsteps.”

The post Can Travel Make You Live Longer? These Scientists Think So.Ìę appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.

The Storm Hits Ìę

I wake up at dawn on Friday, September 27, because the wind is howling around my house and trees are snapping at their trunks and being pulled out of the ground by their roots. From the window I watch the treetops sway and listen for the crack of wood. I hope I can echo-locate the snap so I know where the giant timber is going to fall. At every sound, I worry something will land on my house.

Two large white oaks, one of which is at least a hundred years old (I count the rings later) are pushed over by a massive gust and careen towards my neighbor’s house, where three little girls under the age of 10 live. As one barely misses the walls and crushes a trampoline outside, I slump in relief.

Rain is coming down in a steady stream. The power goes off a few minutes after I wake up. Water is the next to vanish, an hour later. Cell service disappears in the early afternoon. Asheville has wind gusts of 46 miles per hour.

Nobody expected a storm like this in western North Carolina. Hurricanes usually hit the state’s coastal regions, not the mountains. We knew there would be rain and flooding, but nothing at all as catastrophic as what came. My wife and I lived through Asheville’s last hurricane flood, in 2004, when the French Broad River surged into low-lying parts of town. Meteorologists called that event a one-in-100-year flood. They’re saying this storm is a one-in-1,000 year event. I don’t know a single person who evacuated, nor did I ever hear any calls from officials to do so.

When the worst of the storm abates, around noon, I walk into the street and gather with neighbors to make sure everyone is O.K. Kids are crying. People have huddled in their basements. A neighbor who’s a doctor walks up saying a woman at the bottom of our hill has a gash in her neck that won’t stop bleeding because the roof of her house fell on her in bed. Trees are down all over and there’s no clear path to get the woman to a hospital, so I run around looking for a way that a vehicle could get through the carnage. So many power lines are down, so many cars are smashed, so many trees are leaning on homes, and stunned people are standing in their yards. My neighborhood of 19 years feels foreign.

I find the safest way to walk the woman with the neck wound to a point where I think a car could meet us, and I reach a friend who’s headed into my neighborhood with a chainsaw, already out trying to cut through the madness, and have just enough service to tell him where to go before my phone dies. I walk the woman up a hill, with the doctor who’s telling her not to remove the bandage from her neck because you don’t mess with neck wounds, and the woman is crying. She’s afraid of the wind and the trees—after the roof of her house just fell on her.

My friend with the truck and the chainsaw is there, exactly where I told him to meet us, and the woman enters the vehicle and they head towards the hospital. I don’t hear how she is for another three days because there’s no cell service, and nobody hears from anyone unless in a face-to-face conversation.

I go back to my own house to assess the damage and hug my wife and children.

By the end of the day, a crew of men in a truck I’ve never seen before have chainsawed their way through half of the downed trees in the neighborhood. These aren’t city crews or electric-company employees. These are dudes in trucks doing what they can to help.

This is just day one.

The Aftermath of the Storm

Hurricane Helene hit western North Carolina, turning the city of Asheville, the South’s greatest outdoor-adventure town where I have lived for 20 years, and the surrounding mountain communities into a federal disaster zone. The French Broad River crested at more than 24 feet, wiping out the entire River Arts District, a collection of restaurants, breweries, hotels, and art studios a mile west of downtown. Biltmore Village, a hub of higher-end hotels and restaurants and shops, is similarly trashed, whole buildings gutted by the force of the river. Entire neighborhoods have been washed away, with houses and trailers floating downstream and piles of broken lumber everywhere.

I’m incredibly fortunate. Our basement flooded, but no trees hit our house. Nobody in my family was hurt. We live in higher terrain and not along the river corridor, where the worst flooding occurred. So many people are in far worse shape. As I write, 71 people have been confirmed dead across the county. Search and rescue helicopters and ATVs are still looking for missing people every day.

The first few days after the storm were isolating. Navigating the roads was tough because of the downed trees. Nobody had cell or internet service, so we couldn’t check the news or message anyone. I didn’t know the extent of the destruction beyond my own neighborhood. Eventually, we learned to get in the car and listen to the city’s press conferences at 10 A.M. and 4 P.M. every day to grasp the context of the storm. I worked on cleaning up my neighbors’ yards and some trees in the road.

I was lucky in another way, too. We have an old hot tub in our backyard that became our sole source of gray water, and remains so. I used five-gallon buckets to move water from it to our bathtub so we could flush toilets. I cooked meals on our propane grill, pulling food from the fridge before it went bad.

At some point, I learned that the Chamber of Commerce a mile up the street had power and their WiFi was radiating into the parking lot, so twice a day I walked up there to send messages and check the news. I started a fire in the wood stove in our basement to try to dry the water out. Of all the damage Hurricane Helene caused, this is as minor as it gets.

In talking with neighbors, we heard there was no gas for cars because the stations had no power, and that none of the interstates or highways were letting vehicles in or out. We heard other towns—Chimney Rock, Burnsville, Spruce Pine, more—deeper in the mountains fared even worse than Asheville. We learned that the city had organized points of distribution for water and food.

Besides the destruction, mostly what I saw is people taking care of each other. The guy who owns the trendy cafe on the corner a few blocks from my house cranked up his giant pizza oven and served free burgers and chicken sandwiches, feeding 1,500 people. Other neighbors chipped in, setting up stands with free stew and hot dogs.

We were all walking all over the neighborhood and town, asking people we didn’t know if they needed anything.

Almost two weeks after the storm, we still have no power, internet, or running water. I’m still moving water to flush toilets, getting drinking water from distribution points, trying to keep a fire in the basement stove. Cell service came back about six days after the storm.

Every state and federal agency is on the ground. Cops, firefighters, and search-and-rescue teams have come from Indiana, New York, Ohio. There are well-organized official disaster-relief stations and smaller stations set up by civilians. There’s a hard 7:30 P.M. curfew. I’ve heard isolated events of attempted muggings, but mostly it’s peaceful.

Unable to work as a writer without internet or power, I spend my days volunteering. One day I’m cooking burgers at a community center, the next, knocking on doors around Buncombe County doing wellness checks. If you can’t reach a cousin or aunt or spouse in Asheville, you call and ask for someone to check on the person. Volunteers go out to people’s last known addresses and see if they’re OK.

Most of the people I check on are OK. I work on developing the friendliest of door knocks,Ìę something that says, “I’m here to help.” Only one person answered the door with a gun in a holster.

I’m having a hard time putting this into words, but in the midst of all of the destruction and despair that I’ve seen, I’ve also been overwhelmed by a sense of hope and gratitude. Is it cheesy to say this disaster has renewed my faith in humankind? Probably. But that’s fine.

Without water and power, schools are closed, so my kids spend their days volunteering or helping friends clean up their yards. They have sleepovers and walk a mile into town together, just for some semblance of normalcy.

Grocery stores opened on a limited basis a day or so after the storm. One person in, one person out, long lines. Cash only because there was no internet. Now the stores are taking cards again, and you can get much of what you need or want. Most gas stations are open again. The two coolers on my back porch are full of food, and I am still cooking all meals on the propane grill. I’ll need to find more propane soon.

Downtown is a ghost town. Asheville is a tourist draw and obviously there are no tourists right now. A lot of people have left town temporarily as well. Some businesses have boarded up, and only a few shops are open.

My hot tub is almost empty, which means I’ll have to figure out another source soon for non-potable water. I saw the destruction to the reservoir system. It’s extensive; the transmission lines, which carry the water out of the reservoir, were washed out after more than 30 inches of rain fell. The bypass line, which was built as a redundancy measure, also washed out. That particular line was buried 25 feet deep, but the land eroded so much that the pipe was carried away. Crews are working on rebuilding that pipe right now.

The Outdoor Community Steps Up

The day before the storm, I went to to drop off a couple of things for resale. Second Gear is a consignment outdoor-gear shop that gives gently loved items like camp stoves and fleece and tents a second life, an effort in sustainability and in making things affordable to people who want to go outdoors and may lack good gear and equipment. It has a great location in the River Arts District, about 100 yards from the French Broad River.

The next time I saw Second Gear, it was in a video on social media, being swept away by the river. The entire building.

A number of guide services, like paddle-board rental shops and shuttle operators like French Broad Outfitters and Zen Tubing, that were located on the river suffered similar fates. Wrong Way Campground saw massive damage, the river breaching several of their cabins.

The local climbing gym, Cultivate Climbing, closed their flood doors, which would typically keep water out of the building. The river level was so high the waters crested the flood doors, poured in, and turned the building into a swimming pool.

Pisgah and Nantahala National Forests are closed. There’s no telling what sort of damage those mountains have suffered, because all resources right now are still dedicated to helping people in need. I’ve heard of groups of mountain bikers from the local bike club, called SORBA (for the Southern Off-Road Bicycle Association), hiking into small, isolated communities and chainsawing a path for those residents to get out to the nearest fire station.

I’ve heard of fly-fishing guides leading search-and-rescue efforts in the steep mountain hollers where they typically head up fishing adventures.

Several small towns, such as Barnardsville and Spruce Pine, in western North Carolina are isolated, the roads covered in mud and a tangle of pines and hardwoods. Nonprofits and small-town fire departments have been organizing groups of hikers to take supplies into people deep in the mountains who are cut off from the outside world. Volunteers with ATVs are incredibly sought after because they can get into remote places that normal vehicles can’t access.

The French Broad River Keeper, Hartwell Carson, who spearheads stewardship when he’s not assessing storm damage and reports of toxic sludge, mobilizes a crew of volunteers to cook burgers and hot dogs for various communities throughout the region. He’s lobbying for millions of dollars to be allocated to the area specifically to put out-of-work river guides on the job of cleaning up the French Broad.

Astral, an Asheville-based shoe brand that makes popular water shoes and hiking boots, is focusing on supporting remote mountain communities that saw severe hurricane damage. This week, Astral will take a van load of six generators to the tiny town of Buladean, which sits below Roan Mountain in North Carolina’s High Country.

The director of North Carolina Outdoor Economy, Amy Allison, is trying to coordinate coat donations from gear companies outside of the region. It’s warm today, but the temperatures are dropping next week. Many families here don’t have adequate winter gear, and will need coats, hats, and gloves as they navigate the new reality of going to distribution points for drinking water and moving flush water into their homes.

What’s Next for Western North CarolinaÌę

Almost two weeks later, I still try to turn the light on when I walk into a room. According to local press conferences, we’ll probably get power back some time this week, which is great. I’ve heard that the city is sending trucks to take out household trash. There’s no timetable as to when water will be restored. It could be weeks.

Living without running water for a couple of months is hard to fathom, largely because our kids can’t go back to school without it. Schools must have working sprinkler systems in case of fire.

Several families we know have already moved temporarily to other cities and enrolled their kids in schools. My wife is looking into home-school scenarios.

For a couple of days right after the storm there was a constant stream of sirens and chainsaws, but that stopped. Now it’s silent at night. It’s the kind of quiet you get camping in the middle of the woods, but I live on the edge of downtown Asheville. With no lights in my neighborhood, I can see the stars at night. I don’t think any of us will begin to understand the impact of what’s happened for months, when it’s safer and the destruction and loss of lives isn’t so palpable.

In the meantime, we carry on. I have a wood stove. I’ve hooked up a solar shower. I’m trying to work again. Tomorrow I’m cooking burgers for the small town of Barnardsville, 45 minutes north of Asheville. After that I’ll help a friend salvage the fence on his farm, then later in the week help another friend repair his campground. I think I’ve come up with a solution for water to flush my toilets, too. There’s a creek at the bottom of my neighborhood. I’ll put my cold plunge tub in the back of the truck and fill it from the creek with five-gallon buckets, then drive back up to my house and put the water in the hot tub.

It feels good to have a plan.

Graham Averill is șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű magazine’s national-parks columnist. He’s lived in Asheville for more than 20 years. If you want to help locals, lost its warehouse in the flood, and is still distributing food to those in need.

For more by this author, see:

9 Beautiful Mountain Towns in the Southeast

9 Most Underrated National Parks for Incredible Fall Foliage

The post This Is What It’s Like to Live in Asheville After Hurricane Helene appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.

How do you make the world a better place? Identify the organizations supporting their communities in meaningful ways, and help them do their work even better. That’s what the has been doing annually since 2021, and now you can join the effort by on the 2024 finalists.

Each year, the program rewards U.S. and Canadian nonprofits that give back to their communities in unique and effective ways, focusing on categories like veterans’ support and search and rescue operations. For the six category winners, it’s a game changer: they get a customized Defender 130, and five of them take home $25,000 each from the category sponsor. And there’s more: All 30 finalists, including the ultimate winners, receive a $5,000 prize courtesy of presenting sponsor CHASE. Since 2021, the program has gifted 18 customized Defenders and more than $700,000 in cash.

Hundreds of nonprofits submitted video applications for this year’s Defender Service Awards. The finalists—five in each category—now have a chance to make their case to you. Watch their videos, consider their mission and needs, and for your favorites by October 17. And yes, this is one contest where voting early and often is allowed—you can vote once per day in all six categories. Below are the 2024 finalists, including those for the Outdoor Accessibility and Education Award, sponsored by șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű. Find your favorites now!

Animal, Wildlife & Marine Welfare

Presented by Disney

These nonprofits protect those without a voice by supporting community shelters, wildlife rescue programs, and marine conservation.

FINALISTS

• Hickory Haven Fawn Rescue (Belton, SC)
• Lending Paws a Hand (Sanford, NC)
• Marine Mammal Care Center Los Angeles (San Pedro, CA)
• SICSA Pet Adoption & Wellness Center (Washington Township, OH)
• Yamnuska Wolfdog Sanctuary (Cochrane, AB)

Community Services Award

Presented by ei3

This category awards nonprofits that help communities through food, shelter, and environmental programs.

FINALISTS

• Borderlands Restoration Network (Patagonia, AZ)
• Nathaniel’s Hope (Orlando, FL)
• No Child Hungry (Orlando, FL)
• Plastic Ocean Project (Wilmington, NC)
• San Diego Habitat Conservancy (San Diego, CA)

Search, Rescue & Emergency Support Services Award

Presented by PELICAN

When accidents and natural disasters strike, these are the organizations that come to the rescue.Ìę

FINALISTS

• EurĂȘka Recherche et Sauvetage (St-Etienne-des-GrĂšs, QC)
• Inyo County Search & Rescue (Bishop, CA)
• Kittitas County Search & Rescue (Ellensburg, WA)
• Linville-Central Rescue Squad Inc. (Newland, NC)
• Thurston County Unit Washington Explorer Search & Rescue (Lacey, WA)

Veteran & Civil Servant Outreach Award

Presented by Hearts & Science

From veterans to firefighters to police officers and more, the heroes who protect others get much-needed support from these organizations.Ìę

FINALISTS

• Guardian Angels Medical Service Dogs (Williston, FL)
• Heroes Hope (Tulsa, OK)
• Northwest Battle Buddies (Battle Ground, WA)
• Team Red, White & Blue (Floyds Knobs, IN)
• The Station Foundation (Bozeman, MT)

Outdoor Accessibility & Education Award

Presented by șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Interactive Inc.

This category recognizes nonprofits on a mission to get everyone outside, because everyone deserves to benefit from the power of the outdoors.Ìę

FINALISTS

• șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍűs Without Limits (Forest Grove, OR)
• Bionic Project Inc. (Cambridge, MA)
• High Fives Foundation (Truckee, CA)
• Higher Ground (Ketchum, ID)
• Pine River Institute (Toronto, ON)

Defender Service Honorees Award

In an effort to put even more vehicles into the field doing mission-driven work, this category gives past finalists a second chance to win a customized Defender 130.Ìę

HONOREES

• Appalachian Wildlife Refuge (Candler, NC)
• The Big Red Barn Retreat (Blythewood, SC)
• CoolxDad (Houston, TX)
• Enjoy Detroit (Detroit, MI)
• FeedMore WNY (Buffalo, NY)
• Forces of Nature Dance Theatre: Youth & Wellness Program (New York, NY)
• Great Basin K-9 SAR Inc. (Kamas, UT)
• Heroes Homestead (Spokane, WA)
• Kupu (Honolulu, HI)
• Lowcountry Marine Mammal Network (North Charleston, SC)
• Midwest Animal ResQ (Raytown, MO)
• Missouri Search & Rescue K9 Unit (Blue Springs, MO)
• Overtown Youth Center (Miami, FL)
• TEXSAR (Wimberley, TX)
• West Place Animal Sanctuary (Tiverton, RI)

Ìęembraces the impossible. Each member of the Defender family is purposefully designed, highly desirable, and seriously durable. A modern-day hero that respects the past but at the same time anticipates the future. Available in 90, 110, and 130 body styles, with up to eight seats, each has a charisma of its own. A beacon of liberty since 1948, Defender supports humanitarian and conservation work with the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies and the Tusk Trust. The Defender brand is underpinned by Land Rover—a mark of trust built on 75 years of expertise in technology and world-leading off-road capability. Defender is designed and engineered in the UK and sold in 121 countries. It belongs to the JLR house of brands, alongside Range Rover, Discovery, and Jaguar.

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In , Park Spring National Monument in Arizona became the first National Park System site to go cashless. In the years since, roughly 30Ìędestinations made the switch to card or mobile-only payments, including big names like Zion, Yosemite, and the Grand Canyon. This shift was likely insignificantÌęfor the 60 percent of Americans who report using cash for few to none of their purchases each year. But the policy has led to a vociferous backlash fromÌępeople who still prefer to pay with good ol’ fashioned paper money.

The fallout moved from Facebook groups and online forums to the courts on March 6, when three would-be national park visitors filed a lawsuit against the Park Service after being turned away from parks in Arizona, New York, and Georgia (respectively) when they tried to pay the entrance fee in cash. The plaintiffs are seeking a declaratory judgment, which is an official court ruling on a legal uncertainty, in this case, whether or not federal law requires the NPS to accept cash.

The NPSÌęhas not yet issued a statement about the lawsuit, and a spokeswoman that the agency doesn’t comment on ongoing litigation.

For the most part, the parks are going cashless to protect their bottom line. In 2022, Death Valley National Park in California spent $40,000 processing the $22,000 in cash collected there, according to . On , the NPS also points to reduced risk of theft, fewer errors, and shorter transaction times at entrance stations as benefits of a cashless system.

Cash Entry in An Increasingly Cashless World

Patrons who want to pay in cash are concerned about inconvenience, privacy, and access. Not everyone has a credit card or even a bank account, the lawsuit argues. , Elizabeth Dasburg, one of the case’s plaintiffs, was advised by NPS staff at Fort Pulaski National Monument in Georgia to go to a Walmart or grocery store and purchaseÌęan all-purpose cash gift card (like a Visa Prepaid card), which would be accepted as payment, after she wrote a letter of complaint. But if you were turned away at a remote resort entrance, like Death Valley, that errand would take over two hours.

Federal law allows private businesses to choose not to accept payments in cash, but the lawsuit argues that the government doesn’t have the same leeway. It points to specifying that coins and bills “are legal tender for all debts, public charges, taxes, and dues.”

But whether you think paying cash is a right or you’d rather park rangers not have to fend off petty theft, I’d argue that both parties in this lawsuit are wrong. Entry to , everywhere, always, for all Americans.

Should National Parks Even Charge Entrance Fees?

The National Park System was created, according to the laws establishing it, to “provide for the enjoyment of the scenery, natural and historic objects, and wildlife in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.” There’s no fine print saying that these beautiful natural places are actually reserved only for the members of this and future generations who can afford it (and certainly no fine print about whether they’d pay with cash or card).

An annual pass to all NPS sites costs $80. Daily entry, which varies by park, caps out at $35 bucks. You could argue that these aren’t huge sums of money—you might pay more than that for gas to get there and a picnic lunch—but it’s still more than it should be. All NPS sites are on public land. The government can and should impose restrictions to conserve that land, but guests shouldn’t have to worry about being able to afford the visit, especially since anyone paying taxes in the U.S. is already paying for national parks.

The NPSÌędoes make an effort to reduce barriers to access, including financial ones. Only 108 of the 429 locations charge for entry, and there are six days each year when those fees are waived. Since 2015, fourth graders and their families have been eligible for an annual park pass, and veterans, people with disabilities, and seniors all qualify for free or reduced rates.

The parks that charge entry fees are those with high visitor numbers, which means greater wear-and-tear on infrastructure and a need for more staff. The extra funds help keep the park running, and minimize damage to the local environment. According to the NPS, of the revenue collected at a park stay at that same park. But even with entry fees, whether paid in cash or by card, the NPS doesn’t have the money to keep things in tip-top shape. At the end of 2023, the agencyÌęreported a $23.3 billion backlog in repair projects.

All the same, particular locations wouldn’t need to charge guests for those extra funds if Congress gave them a bigger budget. The U.S. government collects trillions of dollars in revenue each year, 3.6 billion of which was allocated to the NPS in 2023 for discretionary spending. I’m not an expert on federal budgeting, butÌęa very small percentage of the overall pool wouldÌęmake the parks accessible for everyone.

The post You Shouldn’t Be Able to Pay With Cash OR a Card at a National Park. They Should Be Free. appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.

For the seventh year running, Finland has been named the happiest country in the world by the United Nations’ World Happiness Report.ÌęThe Nordic nation has long been known for its sauna culture, but the Finns’ enduring well-being goes beyond warm rooms and cold plunges. Some Finns have told the press that their citizens aren’t exactly happy so much as content with what they have, and that work-life balance and state-funded education, childcare, and health care are crucial to the population’s overall positive frame of mind.

Finland isn’t trying to keep their keys to happiness a secret, however. “There is an old Finnish proverb that states, ‘The one who has happiness should hide it.’” said Heli Jimenez, a marketing director at Finland’s tourism department in a statement. “As the world’s happiest country since 2018, we have decided to take the old phrase and update it, making our modern motto: ‘The one who has happiness should share it.’”

In that spirit, anyone curious to try out the Finnish lifestyle for themselves is invited through April 4 to to visit its capital city for five days in June for “Helsinki Happiness Hacks” and learn from locals about the daily habits that underpin the Finnish lifestyle. Visit Finland is covering travel expenses for those selected, and trip highlights include restaurant tours, a walk in the woods, and a sauna rave. Winners will be announced on May 2.

Of course, Finland isn’t the only country in the high ranks of the World Happiness Report this year. Eight of the top ten happiest countries in the world are in Europe, perhaps unsurprisingly, given the region’s notable health care, stable governments, and wealth: Denmark, Iceland, Sweden, the Netherlands, Norway, Luxembourg, and Switzerland. New to the top ten is Australia, and Israel dropped one spot since 2023 (the bulk of data, collected over three years, happened largely before the conflict between Israel and Gaza began on October 7, 2023).

The United States, on the other hand, fell from 15th happiest country in 2022 to 23rd in 2023, not so much because Americans are less happy—according to the report,Ìęour country’s overall score only decreased by one-tenth of a point from last year—but because a surge in life satisfaction in other nations vaulted them above us on the list.Ìę(To check out șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű’s recent research on the happiest places to live in the U.S., read our report.) Afghanistan, once again, was the world’s unhappiest nation.

The UN project uses data from the Gallup World Poll, and considers six key components to overall life satisfaction: wealth, health, personal freedoms, generosity, freedom from corruption, and strength of social ties. The highly anticipated report, which has been released annually on March 20 for more than a decade, marks the International Day of Happiness.

For me and my colleagues at șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű, access to the outdoors is a critical piece of the happiness puzzle. Which is why the top six countries I’d be most excited to visit don’t perfectly align with the UN’s findings. Sorry, Denmark—your artificial ski hill is cool, but the slightly less elated people of New Zealand have world-class heli-skiing.

Here are six of the top fifteen happiest countries in the world that I’d be absolutely overjoyed to visit, along with intel that will spark some ideas for adventure travel there.

Finland (No. 1)

If this video of mountain biker Erkki Punttila sailing over to ride the trails of Lemmenjoki National Park doesn’t make you want to drop everything to travel through Finland’s northern Lapland, we don’t know what to tell you.ÌęActually, we do—consider a winter visit to explore its wilderness on skis (or even traverse the entire country), take a stroll through the forested countryside, and snack on some rye bread and fish.

Iceland (No. 3)

Feeling physically and spiritually depleted by long COVID, author and șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű contributor Pam Houston visited Iceland and its eponymous breed of horses for rejuvenation. I won’t spoil her whole uplifting story of enlightenment, but her tripÌędid offer Houston joy and a whole lot more.

This little island often makes headlines for volcanic (and seismic) activity, but it’s also a nature-loving traveler’s dream. Beaches, mountains, glaciers, hot springs—Iceland has a bit of everything. YouÌę can go full Wim Hof and enjoy scenic (and frigid) cold plunges, opt for a warmer route at beautiful hot springs like the Instagram-famous Blue Lagoon, as well as take in the northern lights, surf Arctic waves, and hike its incredible landscape.

Switzerland (No. 9)

The Alps are home to mountain towns America and the rest of Europe still aspire to. In the winter, outdoor enthusiasts flock to Zermatt, one of the most iconic ski resorts in the world, while summertime treks are straight out of The Sound of Music.

șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű contributor Christopher Solomon recently completed theÌęVia Valais, a 150-mile trail-running-oriented route in southwest Switzerland that was as spectacular as it was demanding. Travelers who prefer to set a slower pace can take their pick of hut-to-hut routes (don’t be fooled the nomenclature—these so-called huts often resemble alpine chalets and are fully stocked with showers, home-cooked meals and cold beer) that allow you to traverse the gorgeous peaks unencumbered by tents and camping supplies.

New Zealand (No. 11)

New Zealand’s South Island recently made our list of most exciting travel destinations in 2024, thanks in large part to its many biking and hiking trails through stunning scenery, and an uptick in new accommodations and exciting restaurants. United Airlines’ new direct flight from San Francisco to Christchurch is a major perk, too.

I’d head to Queenstown during the austral winter to get in some skiing, but a summer trek along one of the Great Walks wouldn’t exactly be a chore, either.

Costa Rica (No. 12)

Costa Rica jumped into the top 15 happiest countries this year from 23rd place in 2023. With all of its outdoor adventures, it’s certainly a happy place for travelers. Take a surf lesson, hike the Camino de Costa Rica, do some yoga on the beach, see a sloth at a wildlife sanctuary, or just read in the sun for a few hours—there are plenty of ways to rest and restore in Costa Rica.

Although it’s one of the most , șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű contributor Jeff Garmire and his partner managed a two-week visit in 2020 for less than $500.

Canada (No. 15)

America’s northern neighbor has a lot going for it, in terms of life satisfaction generally and outdoor recreation opportunities specifically. I’m biased toward British Columbia, which has a lot in common with my beloved childhood home of Western Washington. Rocky beaches, rugged mountains, and lush temperate rainforests are abundant, and Vancouver’s superb dining and arts scene make it the perfect spot to refuel between all the hiking, skiing, surfing, and boating nearby. There’s enough singletrack to keep even the hardest-charging mountain biker satisfied for years. Here’s the perfect itinerary to take in the scenery along the Sea-to-Sky Highway from Vancouver to Whistler.

If the Canadian Rockies are more your speed, Banff lives up to the hype and is a great spot to adventure with your kiddos. Farther east, Quebec is forecast to have incredible views of the aurora borealis this year (as are the Northwest Territories, if you’re looking for an even more remote adventure).

Miyo McGinn is an assistant editor at șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű, and tends to be pretty happy whenever she gets the chance to travel, regardless of the destination. Her next international trip will probably be to Canada, just a few hours’ drive from her home in Bozeman, Montana.Ìę

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