Resources

General Park Information

• The National Park Service (NPS) website features a wealth of information, including interactive maps showing the relative positions of the various park units. However, the NPS maps do not show units maintained by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) or Forest Service (FS). I don’t know of a consolidated map.
• Use this Interactive Map for the Appalachian Trail. These parking tips and this Distance Calculator are also very helpful.
• The NY/NJ Trail Conference has maps and other resources for the Long Path and Shawangunk Ridge Trail .

Books

• The Falcon Guide “Hiking…” series is great for deciding between hikes, finding trailheads, etc. (For example, Hiking Arizona’s Cactus Country .)
• Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods humorously recounts his hike on the Appalachian Trail. Besides his own anecdotes, he gives a lot of trail and local history.
• Kyle Rohrig’s Lost on the Appalachian Trail is a more serious, day-by-day, detail-heavy tale of the realities of through-hiking.

Blogs I follow

• Earthline: the American West
• Explorumentary
• Just Go Travel Studios . The blog supports their park memorabilia business, selling custom items with your photos.
• Red Around the World
• Running to Travel

YouTube channels

• Adventures of A+K
• Jerry Arizona
• Live Hard, Love Hard . Everywhere they go, they choose “hard”.
• Mediocre Amateur . Even harder than the above. No way a regular human can duplicate these outdoor adventures.
• SUV RVing
• Unboring Exploring . She also has an accompanying Facebook page .