national park

National parks that we have visited.

Fishing Bridge RV Park, Yellowstone National Park

We stayed at Fishing Bridge RV Park in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming. (Campground Reviews listing.)

Our fourth stay in Yellowstone, our second in our coach and at this campground. The only place we can stay inside the park in our coach. It’s definitely worthwhile to stay inside the park; it’s a huge place, and the entry lines can be long.

Dates:

  • Check in: 2025-08-24
  • Check out: 2025-09-02
  • 9 nights

Weather:

  • Partly cloudy, some rain
  • High temps 59-73°F, lows 45-50°F
  • Some wind, gusts to 20 MPH, sheltered by trees

Noise:

  • No road noise
  • No train horn noise
  • Lots of neighbor noise

Site:

  • #321, pull-through, concrete
  • Didn’t need to disconnect toad, parked behind coach
  • Somewhat level site; high in front and passenger side; used hydraulic leveling
  • Concrete driveway about 70 feet long by 32 feet wide
  • 54 feet to neighbors on both sides
  • Just grass between sites
  • Picnic table
  • Tall trees behind site
  • Unclean site; lots of small trash (which I picked up)
  • Elevation 7,790 feet, front facing south

Utilities:

  • 50 amp power, very conveniently located
  • 80 PSI water, conveniently located
  • Good sewer connection, but too low, conveniently located (1 10-foot pipe needed)

Internet (in usage priority order):

  • Starlink: 200-219 Mbps down, 27 Mbps up, 45 ms ping
  • RoamLink: 8 Mbps down, 1 Mbps up, 130 ms ping (RoamLink uses whichever is best of AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile)
  • AT&T: 12-30 Mbps down, 2 Mbps up, 150 ms ping (I have AT&T on my iPhone)
  • Campground Wi-Fi: none

Amenities:

  • Garbage dumpsters
  • Inside Yellowstone National Park

See our previous review on Campground Reviews.

Campground map:

Map

An interactive map:

Our site:

Our site

Our site

Our site

Our site

Patio

Disappointingly, there was lots of small garbage around the site. People are the worst:

Garbage

Other sites:

Other sites

Other sites

Other sites

Other sites

Other sites

Pretty basic, but the best (and only) place for us inside Yellowstone. We’ll definitely stay here again.

After visiting all National Parks in the 48 contiguious states, which are our most and least favorites?

There are currently 63 National Parks in the US. Of those, 51 are in the 48 contiguous states, plus eight in Alaska, two in Hawaii, one in American Samoa, and one in US Virgin Islands. We have now visited 52 parks; the 51 contiguous plus Virgin Islands; the remaining 11 will be more tricky to visit, but we do want to get to them in due course.

This is a good occasion to consider how we feel about the 52 parks. And what better way to evaluate them than as a tier list, which rates things as S (super), A, B, C, D, and F (fail).

Here’s how we rated the parks:

NPS tier list

Or in text (click or tap the links to see my blog posts about each park):

S tier: Arches, Grand Canyon, Joshua Tree, Olympic, and Yellowstone. Best of the best.

A tier: Badlands, Big Bend, Bryce Canyon, Death Valley, Dry Tortugas, Everglades, Grand Teton, Isle Royale, Virgin Islands, Yosemite, Zion. All very good parks.

B tier: Acadia, Black Canyon of the Gunnison, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef, Carlsbad Caverns, Crater Lake, Glacier, Kings Canyon, Mesa Verde, Mount Rainier, North Cascades, Petrified Forest, Pinnacles, Redwood, Saguaro, Sequoia, Theodore Roosevelt, Voyageurs, Wind Cave. Still pretty good, but not overly remarkable.

C tier: Biscayne, Channel Islands, Great Basin, Great Sand Dunes, Great Smoky Mountains, Guadalupe Mountains, Hot Springs, Lassen Volcanic, Rocky Mountain, Shenandoah, White Sands. Fine parks, but mostly one-trick-ponies.

D tier: Congaree, Gateway Arch, Mammoth Cave, New River Gorge. Kinda boring, not really worthy of being National Parks.

F tier: Cuyahoga Valley, Indiana Dunes. Lame, shouldn’t be National Parks.

Of course, these rankings are very subjective, and may change as we explore them more. But that’s how we currently rate them.

Wind Cave National Park

We visited Wind Cave National Park again; the previous time, back in 2023, the elevator to the cave was broken, so we were unable to do a tour (but the surface stuff is good too).

This time we were able to do a cave tour: the Garden of Eden tour. This is a one-hour, quarter mile tour (their easiest option), featuring boxwork, frostwork, flowstone and cave popcorn.

Visitor Center

Cave tours:

Cave tours

Cave map:

Cave map

Heading into the elevator, about seven people at a time:

Heading into the elevator

Waiting for everyone in an airlock at the bottom of the elevator:

Airlock at the bottom of the elevator

Exploring the cave:

Wind Cave

Exploring the cave

Wind Cave

Wind Cave

Wind Cave

Wind Cave

Wind Cave

Wind Cave

Wind Cave

Wind Cave

Wind Cave

Wind Cave

Wind Cave

Wind Cave

Wind Cave

Wind Cave

Back to the elevator:

Back to the elevator

Model of the cave tours in the visitor center:

Model of the cave tours in the visitor center

Conditions at the cave mouth; neglegible wind:

Conditions at cave mouth; neglegible wind

The little hole of wind:

The little hole of wind

Not the most impressive cave, but still more interesting than Mammoth Cave.

Voyageurs National Park: Rainy Lake Grand Tour

We visited the Rainy Lake visitor center, and did the Grand Tour guided boat trip in Voyageurs National Park in Minnesota.

Rainy Lake Visitor Center

Our boat:

Our boat

Rainy Lake tour

Rainy Lake tour

A stop at Little American Island, a former mining area:

Little American Island

Mine:

Mine

Little American Island

Back on the boat:

Rainy Lake tour

There are a number of houseboats that people can rent; a fun way to explore the lake:

Houseboat

Exhibits handed around:

Exhibits

Exhibits

Exhibits

Exhibits

Rainy Lake tour

Rainy Lake tour

Rainy Lake tour

Bald eagle:

Bald eagle

A houseboat docked:

Houseboat docked

Rainy Lake tour

Rainy Lake tour

Rainy Lake tour

Rainy Lake tour

Rainy Lake tour

Rainy Lake tour

Back at the visitor center, Jenn with her last passport page of parks in the contiguous 48 states:

Jenn with her last passport page

Exhibits:

Exhibits

Exhibits

Exhibits

Indiana Dunes National Park

We visited Indiana Dunes National Park in Indiana. Perhaps one of the least interesting parks we’ve visited… it really should have remained a National Lakeshore.

To be fair, we were recovering from Covid at the time, so weren’t feeling up for climbing dunes or even walking along the beach… which is pretty much all there is to do there.

Here’s a map of the park; click or tap for a larger edition:

Indiana Dunes map

Indiana Dunes National Park

Bison out front of the visitor center:

Bison

Flowchart of options:

Flowchart of options

Map:

Map

Visitor center:

Visitor center

An art:

An art

Beach access to Lake Michigan:

Beach access to Lake Michigan

Century of Progress historic homes:

Century of Progress historic homes

Century of Progress historic home

Century of Progress historic home

A dune:

Dune

Yawn.