National Parks of North, South America

United States

http://www.nps.gov/oia/around/lac.htm — The National Park Service, NPS, was founded to help create national parks. This website is more about their group then the actual parks themselves but it is still a very interesting read on some of the parks in the United States. This group is a part of the U.S. Department of the Interior.

http://www.nationalparks-worldwide.info/nam/north_america.htm —This site is The National Parks and Nature Reserves of North America. The site pertains to parks in all the North American countries.

http://www.us-national-parks.net/ — This website lists all of the national parks in the United States. It gives a very informative and detailed overview of the parks including maps, directions, camping, lodging and hotels. This is a VERY useful site for anyone planning a trip to a park in the U.S.

http://www.pbs.org/nationalparks/ — This is a website put together by PBS, there is a promotional movie for the United States national parks and essentially tries to convince you of the great experience one would have if they visited a park. This site is definitely very informative and interesting if you watch the video on Yosemite National Park.

http://www.nps.gov/index.htm — This site is a database for parks in the United States. It allows you to search the name of a specific park or search for parks in a specific state. The information given about each park is very detailed and useful for anyone who is planning on traveling or even just researching park in America. The site also has links to other topics such as kids, teachers, how to get involved, and discovering history.

http://www.nationalparks.org/americas-best-idea/ — This site is a non-profit site promoting how to get involved, take advantage, and help make the most of the parks in the United States. The site also promotes a book by Ken Burns entitled, The National Parks: America’s Best Idea. The site shows a good clip on the front page but for the most part would not be entirely useful to most people.

http://www.americasbestonline.net/index.php/pages/NationalParksLeastVisited.html — This website simply provides a list of the top 10 least-visited parks in the U.S. It is not a site specifically made for parks because it has a variety of rankings for different things in America. While there is very little meat to go along with the rankings, the rankings do provide a nice starting ground for parks to research.

http://www.americasbestonline.net/nparksattendance.htm — The same website as the preceding one, however instead of listing the least visited parks, the site lists the most attended parks.

http://www.americasbestonline.net/index.php/pages/nationalparksoldest.html — The site lists the ten oldest parks in the U.S.

http://www.americasbestonline.net/index.php/pages/nationalparks.html — This page lists the 10 best national parks in the U.S.  The list is simply the opinion of the website but it could provide a good starting ground for both research and travel.

http://www.americasbestonline.net/NPKids.html — This page lists the 10 best national parks for kids to enjoy in the U.S. Obviously this list could prove vary useful for family trips.

http://www.americasbestonline.net/cyclingNP.html — This page lists the 10 best national parks for riding your bike. For people interested in cycling and fitness, this page could be a good starting point.

Canada

http://www.pc.gc.ca/eng/index.aspx — This site is the national Canadian park site. It provides all the information you would need to either discover or explore the Canadian parks. The site is offered in English and French and has quick links of campground reservations, national passes, travel planners, media releases, newsletters, and related links. If I were looking for information on parks in Canada, this would undoubtedly be the first site I visit.

http://www.greatcanadianparks.com/ — This site is stacked with information on all of the main national parks in Canada. The way the website is set up makes it difficult to piece together all of the information quickly. However, there is a large amount of information for almost any park in the country. This site is slightly more promotional then the previous, however the information remains reliable and current.

South America

http://www.nationalparks-worldwide.info/sam/south_america.htm — This site is “The National Parks and Nature Reserves of South America.” The site lists all the countries in South America and then goes step for step through all of the different parks and nature reserves in that country, with statistics included. This site is extremely informative and will give you a very good background on any of the major parks and reserves in South America.

http://www.travel-amazing-southamerica.com/south-america-national-parks.html — This site lists the six must see parks in South America. The descriptions are short and there is not a lot of information. This would be a good starting point site if you were looking to travel. More research beyond this site would definitely need to be done if you were doing a thorough investigation.

http://www.mytravelguide.com/attractions/cnattractions-168701-12101 South_America_National_Parks.html — This website is a travel site guide through South American parks. It is equipped with flight details, the best hotel listings, maps, restaurants, and attractions. This site could prove to be a traveler’s handbook because it has all the necessary information you would need to know when traveling.

http://travel.nationalgeographic.com/travel/continents/south-america/ — The National Geographic site is for South America is filled with breathtaking pictures as well as information about all countries in South America with national parks. This is the type of site that you could find yourself browsing for a while even if you are not planning on taking a trip any time soon.

http://usparks.about.com/od/pkssouthamerica/Parks_in_South_America.htm — This website has a relatively brief description of the different parks in the South American countries of Argentina, Chile, and Ecuador. This site is very basic and would only be good for general information and the very beginnings of a search.

http://www.gorp.com/weekend-guide/travel-ta-argentina-sidwcmdev_067890.html — This site is essentially a small database for all of the South American parks. They are listed under their respective countries and there is a link that provides more information to each of them. Depending on the link you click there could be a short paragraph about the park or a longer more detailed description.