12 Wonderful National Park Adventures to Take With Kids

By Michael Lanza

America’s 63 national parks preserve over 52 million acres of uniquely beautiful and genuinely awe-inspiring places in nature, and the payoff for our country’s foresight in protecting them is a lifetime’s worth of unforgettable experiences—many of them entirely feasible, safe, and really fun for families with kids of all ages. Best of all, you’ll find that sharing these adventures will create your best times together as a family, as they have for mine.

And here’s an insider tip: These adventures aren’t just for families. Adults with a wide range of outdoors experience—including little to none—will find these trips thrilling, fascinating, and inspirational.

This story describes 10 of the very best adventures my family has taken, many of them personal favorites from among the countless trips I’ve taken over three decades as an outdoors writer, including more than 10 years running this blog and previously 10 years as a field editor for Backpacker magazine.


Hi, I’m Michael Lanza, creator of The Big Outside. Click here to sign up for my FREE email newsletter. Join The Big Outside to get full access to all of my blog’s stories. Click here for my e-guides to classic backpacking trips. Click here to learn how I can help you plan your next trip.


A teenage boy hiking Angels Landing in Zion National Park.
My son, Nate, hiking Angels Landing in Zion National Park.

Each trip description below offers a suggested minimum age—which will certainly vary based on every child’s (and parent’s) personal experience and comfort level—and links to a full feature story at The Big Outside, which share more images (and those stories require a paid subscription to read in full, including my detailed tips on planning each trip).

Not surprisingly, all of these trips require planning and making reservations months in advance. See my Custom Trip Planning page to learn how I can help you plan any trip you read about at this blog.

Please share your experiences, questions, and advice on any of these trips, or suggest your own favorite national park family adventures in the comments section at the bottom of this story. I try to respond to all comments.

Two school-age kids standing under the General Sherman Tree in Sequoia National Park.
My kids standing under the General Sherman Tree in Sequoia National Park.

Stand in the Shadow of a Giant Sequoia

Any Age

If you’re going to be a tree hugger, you might as well go big. The giant sequoias of Sequoia National Park can live more than 3,000 years, grow as tall as a 26-story building, and have a base diameter of 36 feet. The General Sherman Tree is the largest in the world at 52,508 cubic feet (1,487 cubic meters), 275 feet tall, and estimated to weigh 2.7 million pounds. The General Grant Tree is the second largest at 46,608 cubic feet (1,320 cubic meters). Try hugging them.

A young girl backpacking the High Sierra Trail above Hamilton Lakes, Sequoia National Park.
My daughter, Alex, backpacking the High Sierra Trail above Hamilton Lakes, Sequoia National Park, which is also the lead photo at the top of this story.

The Giant Forest in Sequoia contains half of the Earth’s largest trees, more than 8,000 sequoias. You can stand under scores of them, including the General Sherman Tree, on a hike of an hour or less. From Wolverton Road, off the Generals Highway, a half-mile trail leads to the General Sherman Tree. The 0.7-mile Big Trees Trail begins at the Giant Forest Museum.

Is your family ready for a bigger adventure? Read about my family’s 40-mile backpacking trip in Sequoia, where we had a wilderness giant sequoia grove all to ourselves, plus see photos of the General Sherman Tree and Grant Grove in my story “Heavy Lifting: Backpacking Sequoia National Park.” And see all stories about Sequoia National Park at The Big Outside.

Make every family adventure better with my “10 Tips For Keeping Kids Happy and Safe Outdoors
and “5 Tips for Hiking With Young Kids from an Outdoors Dad.”

 

A hot spring in Midway Geyser Basin, Yellowstone National Park.
A hot spring in Midway Geyser Basin, Yellowstone National Park.

Feel the Magic of Yellowstone

A family at Grand Prismatic Spring in the Midway Geyser Basin, Yellowstone.
My family at Grand Prismatic Spring in the Midway Geyser Basin, Yellowstone.

Any Age

Since Americans first began exploring the Yellowstone region, people have stood in awe of its marvels: megafauna like elk, bison, and grizzly bears, spectacular waterfalls, and more than 10,000 geothermal features, including hot springs, mud pots, fumaroles, and at least 300 geysers—two-thirds of the planet’s known total.

We first took our kids to Yellowstone when they were four and two years old, and although they don’t remember that visit, they delighted in the animals and thermal features—and they could enjoy them because so many of Yellowstone’s highlights can be seen on short walks or hikes that are easy enough to do with very young kids.

Some of my favorite spots, like Grand Prismatic Spring, the park’s largest, in the Midway Geyser Basin, require only a short stroll on a boardwalk. An easy walking tour of Mammoth Hot Springs, the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone River, and even the Upper Geyser Basin (which includes Old Faithful) can be done in an hour or two.

See my stories “The Ultimate Family Tour of Yellowstone,” “The 10 Best Hikes in Yellowstone,” “Cross-Country Skiing Yellowstone,” and all stories about Yellowstone National Park at The Big Outside.

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A raft floating the Green River through Stillwater Canyon in Canyonlands National Park.
A raft floating the Green River through Stillwater Canyon in Canyonlands National Park.

Float the Green River Through Canyonlands National Park

Ages 4 and Up

Our son was six and our daughter barely four when we took a five-day, five-family float trip mostly on the Green River in southern Utah’s Canyonlands National Park. From the put-in at Mineral Bottom through 52 miles of Stillwater Canyon on the Green and then four miles more on the Colorado River to the takeout at Spanish Bottom, the river slowly unfurls beneath a constant backdrop of soaring redrock cliffs and spires.

A hiker in early morning high above Stillwater Canyon on the Green River in Canyonlands National Park.
Mark Fenton hiking in early morning high above Stillwater Canyon on the Green River in Canyonlands National Park.

Our flotilla of rafts, two kayaks, and a canoe quickly morphed into a slowly drifting party of water-gun fights and occasional swims to cool off, interspersed with frequent moments of gazing at brilliantly red canyon walls rising hundreds of feet above us. Off the water, we took side hikes to high overlooks of the canyon and centuries-old Puebloan rock art and cliff dwellings and camped on sandy beaches and slickrock benches. You might even spot bighorn sheep scrambling around on the canyon’s precipitous rock faces.

The flat water is ideal for beginners, campsites are spacious and lovely, and the scenery is out of this world from put-in to takeout. Rentals of boats and river gear, plus shuttles to the put-in and from the takeout (via a very scenic motorboat tour) are available from local outfitters in nearby Moab.

See my story “Still Waters Run Deep: Tackling America’s Best Multi-Day Float Trip on the Green River” and all stories about floating the Green River at The Big Outside.

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My son, Nate, underneath Double Arch in Arches National Park.

Climb Into Natural Arches

Ages 5 and Up

Arches National Park in southeastern Utah has many geologic wonders to recommend it, but from a kid’s perspective, one of the coolest experiences is scrambling up underneath an arch like Double Arch in the park’s Windows Section or Partition Arch in Devils Garden—the first a short walk, the second a hike of two to three hours round-trip.

Skyline Arch in Arches National Park.
Skyline Arch in Arches National Park.

For short, easy walks to several arches, feasible with young kids, start in the Windows Section, where you can get up close and personal with Double Arch, Turret Arch, and South Window. For a longer but relatively flat hike of up to a half-day (although you can shorten it), explore Devils Garden, including Pine Tree, Navajo, and Partition arches, and the park’s longest, Landscape Arch.

Skyline Arch, which is a short hike but sits by itself and thus attracts fewer people, sits high on the wall of a narrow canyon, and you can scramble up the canyon’s opposite wall for a bird’s-eye view of the arch. If you have a full day, take a ranger-guided tour of the Fiery Furnace, a maze of narrow canyons.

See my story “No Straight Lines: Backpacking and Hiking in Canyonlands and Arches National Parks,” and all stories about Arches National Park at The Big Outside.

Serious adventures demand serious gear. See “The 10 Best Down Jackets
and “The Best Rain Jackets For Hiking and Backpacking”.”

 

A teenage boy hiking Angels Landing, Zion National Park.
My son, Nate, hiking Angels Landing in Zion National Park.

Hike Zion’s Breathtaking Trails

Ages 6 and Up

Even among America’s flagship national parks—gems like Yosemite, Grand Canyon, and Yellowstone—Zion stands out for having several dayhikes that would make the top 10 list of many avid hikers. Angels Landing, The Narrows, the West Rim Trail, Hidden Canyon, and Observation Point, to name just a handful that begin right in Zion Canyon, feature scenery that actually does justice to the adjective “breathtaking.” No other place really compares to Zion.

Woman and two young children backpacking the West Rim Trail in Zion National Park.
My wife, Penny, with our kids, Nate and Alex, hiking up the West Rim Trail on a family backpacking trip in Zion National Park.

If your family is ready for a multi-day backpacking trip, Zion offers some of the best in the national parks, including an overnight hike in the Narrows and trips of two to four days in the Kolob Canyons and on the West Rim Trail or combining those two areas of the park on a beautiful traverse. And among technical dayhikes that require appropriate gear and skills like rappelling and navigating and wading slot canyons with cold pools of water, few compare with Zion’s Subway.

These hikes and others range widely in distance, difficulty, and gut-churning excitement quotient, and comfort level doesn’t always correlate directly with age. Stop in the park visitor center for information about these hikes, including current conditions; rangers can let you know when to avoid some of them.

See my stories “The 10 Best Hikes in Zion National Park,” “Hiking Angels Landing: What You Need to Know,” “Pilgrimage Across Zion: Traversing a Land of Otherworldly Scenery,” “Luck of the Draw, Part 2: Backpacking Zion’s Narrows,” my expert e-guide to backpacking Zion’s Narrows, and all stories about Zion National Park at The Big Outside.

Explore the best of the Southwest. See “The 12 Best Hikes in Utah’s National Parks
and “The 10 Best Backpacking Trips in the Southwest.”

A hiker on the John Muir Trail in Yosemite overlooking Half Dome, Liberty Cap, and Nevada Fall.
My wife, Penny, on the John Muir Trail in Yosemite overlooking Half Dome, Liberty Cap, and Nevada Fall.

Stand Beneath Yosemite’s Waterfalls and Summit Half Dome

Ages 7 and Up

Yosemite Valley and its surrounding high country was an early inspiration for creating a system of national parks—and the source of that inspiration becomes clearer when you explore beyond the Valley’s busy roads, hiking to its justifiably world-famous waterfalls and the summit of one of Yosemite’s iconic landmarks, Half Dome.

Upper Yosemite Falls in Yosemite National Park.
Upper Yosemite Falls in Yosemite National Park.

Dayhike the 7.2-mile, 2,700-vertical-foot Upper Yosemite Falls Trail to the brink of that waterfall, which plunges a sheer 1,400 feet through the air; or hike only about an hour to 90 minutes up that trail to a spot close enough to the base of the waterfall to feel the light rain of its mist.

The 6.3-mile, 2,000-vertical-foot loop on the Mist Trail and John Muir Trail takes you through the raining mist of 317-foot-tall Vernal Fall—which can be drenching in late spring—and both below and above the thunderous plume of nearly 600-foot-tall Nevada Fall.

Fit hikers—including older kids—with strong endurance can continue past Nevada Fall to dayhike up the exposed cable route to the summit of Half Dome, a 16-mile, 4,800-foot round trip that requires a permit. Adventurous families can venture beyond dayhiking distance, with myriad choices for five-star backpacking trips of virtually any length and difficulty.

See my stories “The 12 Best Dayhikes in Yosemite,” “The Magic of Hiking to Yosemite’s Waterfalls,” “Hiking Half Dome: How to Do It Right and Get a Permit,” “The 8 Best Backpacking Trips in Yosemite,” and all stories about Yosemite National Park at The Big Outside.

See also my e-guides to three amazing backpacking trips in Yosemite.

I’ve helped many readers plan unforgettable adventures in Yosemite and elsewhere.
Want my help with yours? Find out more here.

 

A young boy hiking in the North Fork Cascade Canyon in Grand Teton National Park.
My son, Nate, on a family backpacking trip in Grand Teton National Park. Click photo for my e-guide “The Best Short Backpacking Trip in Grand Teton National Park.”

Ascend Into the Tetons

Ages 7 and Up

Regular readers of this blog know that the Tetons are one of my favorite mountain ranges—I’ve made more than 20 trips dayhiking, backpacking, climbing, and backcountry skiing there—and I rank the Teton Crest Trail among “America’s Top 10 Best Backpacking Trips.”

Backpackers on the Teton Crest Trail on Death Canyon Shelf, Grand Teton National Park.
My son, Nate, and friend Mike Baron backpacking the Teton Crest Trail on Death Canyon Shelf, Grand Teton National Park.

But the TCT is an ambitious and moderately strenuous hike of at least four days for most adults. The first Teton backpacking trip I took my kids on, when they were eight and six, was a three-day hike of Grand Teton’s nearly 20-mile Paintbrush-Cascade Canyons Loop.

Probably the most popular backpacking route in the park because of its relatively short distance, easy access, and stellar scenery, it takes you through two of the park’s most stunning canyons and over one of the highest mountain passes reached by a trail in the park, 10,700-foot Paintbrush Divide (which can be difficult to cross, due to snow, until August). Campsites in Upper Paintbrush Canyon have views of soaring, striated canyon walls, and in the North Fork of Cascade Canyon you will drink in a stunning view of the Grand Teton framed by canyon walls—still one of my favorite backcountry campsites ever.

See all of my stories about backpacking Grand Teton National Park, including “A Wonderful Obsession: Backpacking the Teton Crest Trail,” my story about backpacking the TCT with my family, and “How to Get a Permit to Backpack the Teton Crest Trail,” with tips relevant to applying for a permit for any trip in the park.

Click here now to get my e-guide to the best short backpacking trip in Grand Teton National Park. Click here to see all of my e-guides.

A mother and young daughter paddling a mangrove tunnel on the East River, in Florida's Everglades region.
My daughter, Alex, and wife, Penny, paddling a mangrove tunnel on the East River, on the edge of Florida’s Everglades.

Immerse Yourself in the Wild Everglades

Ages 7 and Up

Young kids playing on the beach near sunset on Tiger Key in the Ten Thousand Islands, Everglades National Park.
The kids playing on the beach near sunset on Tiger Key in the Ten Thousand Islands, Everglades National Park.

The Everglades is the kind of place that will shock you with its uniqueness and abundance of exotic fauna. Paddling sit-on-top kayaks on a placid river that flowed through mangrove tunnels, and canoes in the generally calm, shallow waters of the Ten Thousand Islands, my family watched an almost constant aerial parade of white ibises, black anhingas, tri-colored herons, brown pelicans and great blue herons fly just overhead.

On one paddling tour from the campsite we had to ourselves on a wilderness beach—where we watched the sun sink into the Gulf of Mexico—my son and I twisted around excitedly in our seats as a dolphin circled our canoe several times. On another paddle with my daughter, we exchanged long gazes with a gaggle of roseate spoonbills perched in a tree.

Much of the Everglades is a vast wilderness—at 1.5 million acres, the third-largest national park in the contiguous United States, bigger than Glacier or Grand Canyon and twice the size of Yosemite—offering opportunities for remote, multi-day, water-based adventures. But there are family-friendly options, like paddling canoes for a few hours on a well-marked water route to camp on a beach you have to yourselves.

See my story “Like No Other Place: Paddling the Everglades.”

Paddling the Everglades is one of “The 10 Best Family Outdoor Adventure Trips.”

A young boy backpacking the Olympic coast near Strawberry Point, Olympic National Park.
My son, Nate, backpacking the Olympic coast near Strawberry Point, Olympic National Park.

Hike and Camp on the Wild Olympic Coast

Ages 7 and Up

Starfish, mussels, anemones on a boulder, Olympic coast.
My son, Nate, standing atop a boulder wallpapered with starfish, mussels, anemones on the southern Olympic coast.

My kids, who were nine and seven when we backpacked this three-day, 17.5-mile traverse of Washington’s southern Olympic coast, remember playing for hours in tide pools; exploring a massive boulder wallpapered with mussels, sea anemones, and sea stars; and climbing up and down thrilling rope ladders on steep headwalls. They still call it one of their favorite trips (and it’s one of my top 10 family adventures).

The adults on this hike remember it for the rich sea life and birds—we saw seals, a sea otter, a great blue heron, and other wildlife—as well as the scenery, with scores of sea stacks rising straight out of the ocean and giant trees behind the beach.

It’s a surprisingly rugged trip—which goes far in explaining why fewer backpackers hike the southern stretch of the Olympic coast compared to the less-strenuous northern stretch. But many kids who’ve done some dayhiking and backpacking will do just fine—and revel in the adventurousness nature of it. Parents would have to feel either comfortable guiding their kids on the mandatory rope ladders or confident in their kids’ ability to managing them on their own.

See my story “The Wildest Shore: Backpacking the Southern Olympic Coast” and all stories about Olympic National Park at The Big Outside.

Planning your next big adventure? See “America’s Top 10 Best Backpacking Trips
and “The 25 Best National Park Dayhikes.”

Young kids hiking the Gunsight Pass Trail in Glacier National Park.
My kids hiking the Gunsight Pass Trail in Glacier National Park.

Backpack in Glacier National Park

Ages 8 and Up

Mountain goat along Glacier National Park's Gunsight Pass Trail.
A mountain goat seen from the Gunsight Pass Trail, high above Gunsight Lake in Glacier National Park.

As my family hiked up the Gunsight Pass Trail on our way to that 6,900-foot pass in Glacier National Park, a mountain goat, as white as fresh snow, with sharp, straight horns, hopped onto the trail not 50 feet ahead of us, on a stretch where the path clings to the face of a cliff. We stopped, and my kids, then nine and seven, glanced back and forth between the goat and my wife and me, simultaneously amazed and wondering what came next.

We waited. And when the goat finally relinquished the trail to us, scrambling nimbly down the cliff below, we peered over the brink to see where it went—but it had disappeared. My daughter, Alex, muttered, “I can’t believe it went down there.”

The 20-mile Gunsight Pass Trail traverse from the Jackson Glacier Overlook to Lake McDonald Lodge, both on the Going-to-the-Sun Road, takes in views of glaciers and rocky peaks and features campsites at Gunsight Lake and Lake Ellen Wilson that sit beneath tall cliffs spliced by waterfalls. It offers a relatively short but incredibly scenic backpacking trip with easy transportation logistics: Both trailheads are served by the park’s free shuttle bus. It’s also not crowded with dayhikers like trails around Many Glacier and Logan Pass.

See my story “Jagged Peaks and Wild Goats: Backpacking Glacier’s Gunsight Pass Trail,” “How to Get a Permit to Backpack in Glacier National Park,” and all stories about backpacking in Glacier at The Big Outside.

See my “10 Tips for Taking Kids on Their First Backpacking Trip
and my very popular “10 Tips For Raising Outdoors-Loving Kids.”

 

A young girl backpacking on Horseshoe Mesa in the Grand Canyon.
My daughter, Alex, backpacking on Horseshoe Mesa in the Grand Canyon.

Descend Into the Grand Canyon

Ages 8 and Up

The Grand Canyon looks impressive from its rim, but you really have to hike down into the Big Ditch to experience the full Alice-down-the-rabbit-hole sensation of its awesome scale. With virtually no vegetation obstructing the long vistas, towers thousands of feet tall appear to balloon to massive dimensions as you slowly approach them, until they dwarf their surroundings, then shrink into the background as you hike farther away. After many visits, I’ve yet to find a mediocre view or a bad backcountry campsite.

A school-age girl backpacking the Tonto Trail in the Grand Canyon.
My daughter, Alex, at 10, backpacking the Tonto Trail in the Grand Canyon.

Get that experience on a dayhike or backpacking trip into the canyon. Hike either of the easily accessed and best-constructed trails dropping into the canyon from the South Rim. Follow the Bright Angel Trail down as far as you want—there are numerous logical turnaround points within the first few miles, or go all the way to Indian Garden (nine miles and nearly 3,000 feet round-trip).

Or descend the South Kaibab Trail, one of America’s most scenic footpaths, with constant, ridge-crest views of a huge swath of the canyon. Accessible backpacking options off the South Rim allow for trips of two to five days or more.

See my e-guide “The Best First Backpacking Trip in the Grand Canyon” and all stories about the Grand Canyon at The Big Outside.

Get the right pack for you. See my picks for “The 10 Best Backpacking Packs
and “The 10 Best Hiking Daypacks.”

Michael Lanza's family sea kayaking in Johns Hopkins Inlet, Glacier Bay National Park.
My family sea kayaking in Johns Hopkins Inlet in Alaska’s Glacier Bay National Park.

Sea Kayak Back to the Ice Age

Ages 8 and Up

Southeast Alaska’s Glacier Bay is the size of Connecticut and sits at the heart of a contiguous protected wilderness the size of Greece. There are simply few places of this size that are as pristine on the entire planet.

Steller sea lions on tiny South Marble Island, Glacier Bay National Park.
Steller sea lions on tiny South Marble Island, Glacier Bay National Park.

Glacier Bay has seen the fastest glacial retreat on Earth: Two centuries ago, there was no Glacier Bay, just a colossal river of ice 4,000 feet thick and 20 miles wide stretching 100 miles into the St. Elias Mountains. The ice has since pulled back 65 miles, creating a fjord with 1,200 miles of coastline that provides a living window into what the world looked like at the end of the last Ice Age.

On a multi-day sea kayaking trip, camping every night on a secluded, wilderness beach, you can see massive tidewater glaciers explosively calving bus-sized chunks of ice into the sea, humpback whales, orcas, Steller sea lions, mountain goats, seals, sea otters, brown bears, and a variety of birds and wildflowers—not to mention views of some of the more than 50 glaciers covering 1,375 square miles of the park, and peaks that rise to over 15,000 feet.

See my story “Back to the Ice Age: Sea Kayaking Glacier Bay.”

See also all stories about national park adventures and family adventures at The Big Outside.

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