Junior Ranger Programs

“I, (fill in name), am proud to be a National Park Service Junior Ranger. I promise to appreciate, respect, and protect all national parks. I also promise to continue learning about the landscape, plants, animals and history of these special places. I will share what I learn with my friends and family.”

Kids interested in exploring? Do they enjoy art, history, science, animals or nature? Junior Ranger programs help keep your kids’ ears and eyes open as you explore your National parks.

Junior Ranger programs are usually free (or nominal for supplies) and are offered in about 286 of the 388 National parks. The programs are typically available for children ages 6 through 14 (depending upon the park you are visiting.) Zion National Park, for instance, has a program designed for children ages 6 to 12, but children under 6 can complete an activity sheet to earn a decal from the Zion Canyon Visitor Center. At the Grand Canyon, there are now 5 ways for you to complete the Junior Ranger requirements (ages 4 and up) and be sworn in as a Grand Canyon National Park Junior Ranger. Their requirements include writing down your observations, answering questions about the park, writing poems and attending one of their Ranger-led programs offered throughout the day. Upon completion of the activities for your age group, bring the booklet back to the Visitor Center for review by a ranger.
Some ways to prepare for these programs would be to eat before you go. No food or snacks are served during the programs. Wear closed-toe shoes – activities are typically held outside and sandals are not usually allowed. BYOW – Bring your own water. And be prompt – Programs start right on time, and kids will need to arrive approximately 15 minutes early to register.

Fun, new airline websites

Unless you've been under a rock, you know about websites to book airfares such as Expedia, Travelocity and Priceline. As you can imagine, we have access to a ton of industry information, including some that still comes from magazines (I know it's hard to imagine...). Now that we're in our off-season, we get a chance to get caught up on our reading. One of our regular reads is Travel and Leisure magazine. One of the few things that we do not include in our road trip adventure packages is airfare. So here are a few sites that were in an article from T&L earlier this year:

1) www.momondo.com - This is a great site to help you uncover cheap flights around the world. They do this by searching over 450 websites to give you the cheapest deals available.
2) www.yapta.com - This site can help you keep tabs on changes to fares both before and after your flight so you can get any applicable credits or refunds. Know that the refund policies are only applicable if you book directly with the airline.
3) www.milemaven.com - This site is updated daily to give you the latest on limited time offers for bonus miles. The search capability will allow you to search by the frequent flyer program so you can work on cranking up those miles in your favorite awards program.

Hopefully this information is a help to you in planning your vacation with Tracks & Trails. Let us know how else we can be of assistance!

Low holiday airfares and where to go!

While we are all hearing about doom and gloom in the economy (and it may be worse for some than others), we are hoping that would-be travelers are seeing the economy of a Tracks & Trails vacation. One portion of a total vacation, in addition to what we provide on the ground - either RV or car-based National Park vacations - there is another significant cost to most of our clients: airfare.

We have written in this blog in a previous post about airfares being more affordable due to the price of oil falling back to more financially reasonable levels. We have also been reading about holiday airfare sales right around the corner. In the coming days and weeks, there may be discounts up to 25% on airfares to key gateway cities. This is great news since we see an opportunity for families to spend their holidays in new, different and exciting locales such as Tucson, Florida and San Diego. Depending on what you want to do, each of these three destinations has so much to offer.

The wild west of Arizona calls in our most popular winter destination, Tucson. The trip from our catalog called Tucson, Tombstone and the Sonoran Desert features great sites such as Kartchner Caverns, western movie sets, the world's largest outdoor airplane display and wildlife uniquely adapted to the desert.



Don't forget the the quintessential winter getaway - the state of Florida. This is a new region for us and our Orlando-based RV vacation and our Florida Keys trip are hard to beat! If you're trying to beat the cold, then a Tracks & Trails Florida trip is the answer. This is also a great location to bring together family for a reunion. We have experience with planning family reunions, honeymoons and just good ol' fashioned family fun.

To visit the San Diego area, we have created a beach and desert itinerary that will give you a great mix of activities where you can visit the world famous San Diego Zoo, pedal around La Jolla or off-road in the Anza-Borrego Desert. Some have described the beautiful weather in San Diego as the most ideal in the 48 states. And there is so much to do! Check our our San Diego itinerary for a taste of what's possible!

If you're thinking of somewhere else to play for the holidays, give one of our trip consultants a call at 800-247-0970 and we'll see how we can help you create a holiday trip of a lifetime!

Spotlight on Lake Powell Resorts & Marinas

Lake Powell Resorts & Marinas, managed by Aramark, is an authorized concessioner of the National Park Service, Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. From camping at the Lake Powell Campground to renting jet boats and water toys, boat tours, fine dining at the Lake Powell Resort and houseboat rentals – they offer something for every one of our families to enjoy at beautiful Lake Powell!

Michael and I recently attended a tour operator “familiarization” conference with representatives from Lake Powell Resorts. This was in part to discuss houseboat rentals and operation and to meet with other tour operators. Our very generous hosts also treated us to a tantalizing dinner at the Lake Powell Resort, a day of jet boating in and out of the beautiful canyons at Lake Powell, an evening on houseboats moored at the beach in Warm Creek Bay, and a ½ day boat tour to Rainbow Bridge National Monument.

The water was like glass in this canyon – you can hardly tell where the water begins and the canyon walls end.

Opportunities to visit with suppliers give us first-hand experiences to pass on to our clients - and the opportunity to experience what our clients will do on their vacations? - priceless! Sound like fun? Check out these trips on our website: Exploring the Southwest's Canyons and Lake Powell; and Utah's Amazing Canyons and Lake Powell.

These are our charming Lake Powell hostesses Sarah Bailey, Assoc. Director of Sales, and Laura Litke, Group Sales & Conference Services Mgr. With 10 years of combined experience, they help us make sure that your visit to Lake Powell is all that it can be!

How about Canadian bargains?

Here is an addendum to the last post -

With the current exchange rate being so in favor of the US dollar versus the Canadian dollar, we are strongly urging our clients that are planning a trip to Vancouver, Victoria, Calgary, Jasper, Banff or other western Canada destinations, to BOOK NOW! Much of last year the exchange rate was at par or US$1 equaled CD$1. As of today, US$1 buys CD$1.27. This is a great opportunity to essentially get more than a 20% discount on a trip to Canada. We can book your RV now and the sooner you pay for the RV rental portion of your trip, the sooner you can lock in what are unprecedented exchange rates. Early bookings are also getting a discount on top of the great exchange rate for booking and paying early.

Please, if you have any questions, you can call me directly at 800-247-0947 or comment on this post. You can also reach one of our talented and gifted Tracks & Trails trip consultants at the same toll-free number above.

Looking for bargains?

Many factors will affect travel for pleasure in the next 12 months and we are seeing many reasons to book now for next year's summer vacation. We realize that many folks are watching their wallets very closely and have concerns about their job security. Optimistically, we also see that most people are still working and many still want to show their kids the National Parks.


First, with the price of oil down 50% from its record highs in the summer, airlines are not under the same financial pressure as they were just a few months ago. I personally have been getting fare alerts from a major travel website nearly weekly with great prices and availability.


Second, we still see the RV as the vehicle of choice when it comes to packing everyone comfortably to experience the great outdoors of the National Parks. There is nothing like staying in the parks, seeing stars at night and having a campfire. Your meals can be much healthier than eating out and cost less too. Overall, for the experience, we see RV travel as a great bargain.


Third, with many travelers looking for big bargains, we have found that we can still help with creating an itinerary that includes a rental car or SUV that is sized to your family or group and accomodations that will save travel dollars. While eating out becomes more of a necessity, you can still eat healthy if you have a simple cooler with you in the car.


Our hope is that you let us help you with your National or state park vacation plans. If cost is an issue, let us know and we'll do our best to create the best vacation that meets your desires and is within your budget. You can call toll-free at 800-247-0970 to talk to a trip consultant or check out our trip catalog on-line. We're ready to help plan that "trip of a lifetime".

Just got back from Lake Powell

Sorry it's been a while since we've posted on the blog. We've been taking some time off to recharge, visit some new destinations and reconnect with some of our outfitters, campgrounds and the road itself. We've spent time researching Florida from Orlando, St. Augustine and the Kennedy Space Center down to Key West. We also did some preliminary research on the Canadian Maritime provinces, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland.

This past week some of us spent time just outside Canyonlands National Park (someone turned 50, eek!), in and around Monument Valley and cruising Lake Powell.

The picture to the right is from the Salt Creek Overlook just south of Canyonlands National Park. While you can't get here with an RV, it's a good example of the types of vistas you can see in this area (it was pretty quiet at night too!). Unfortunately, the best time to see stars was at about 3:00 AM since there was a strong full moon.





This is a picture of the Mittens in Monument Valley. We had strong winds with gusts over 50 mph, so this shot was from inside the car. Unfortunately with the sand and dust being kicked up, we had to cancel our tour of Mystery Valley. Oh well, maybe next time... Wildlife highlight: We did get to see an adult brown tarantula on the road as we drove through Valley of the Gods!



Our last stop was in Lake Powell. We had a chance to visit with

some of the folks that run the Navajo Village Heritage Center in Page, AZ. We found that if you want be thoroughly educated on Navajo culture and heritage, this is the place. The four families that have created the Center, go to great lengths to provide an authentic experience. Here is a picture of one of the hogans they built at the Center.




We also visited the slot canyons just east of Page called Upper Antelope Canyon. This unique canyon is well known to photographers around the globe for the unique interior structure and lighting that changes by the minute. Here is a good example of a picture that I took with a simple digital camera. I think that it's amazing... Look at the purples that show up in the rock in this picture!


We also visited with the folks at the Lake Powell Resort. We got to experience what our clients see when they take the Half Day Rainbow Bridge Tour or enjoy a rented powerboat around the lake as we snaked up through narrow canyon walls. A new experience for us to spend the night on a houseboat rental with the lake like glass and a full moon. Wildlife highlight: We saw an adult California Condor (tagged "02") at the Visitor's Center at the Glen Canyon Dam. Just stunning...


Yes, we're lucky to take these types of trips and we try to take a bunch of pictures so we can share them with the rest of the staff. All the information that we gather on trips like these are designed to help us provide the best assistance possible when planning what may be a "trip of a lifetime" for some of our clients. Just give us a call or check out the website to see where we can start!

A big thank you to Shane and Emmy at the Navajo Village Heritage Center, Carolene at Antelope Canyon Tours, the staff at the Glen Canyon Dam (great tour!) and Laura, Sarah, Rusty and Chef Josh at Lake Powell Resorts. You all made our trip wonderful and informative. Thank YOU!