We can’t visit national parks right now. But we can celebrate them.
Each year, our country celebrates National Park Week from April 18 to 25. Usually, festivities include special events at national parks across the country. Although we can’t visit, drive, or hike through many of the parks this year, we can still acknowledge the parks we love in other ways.
So in honor of National Park Week, here are five ways to celebrate with our favorite people and teams who work to capture the spirit of these beautiful places through art, film, and more.
1. Virtually Visit a National Park
The National Park Foundation has created virtual tours for this year’s National Park Week. Including live webcams, you can visit over a dozen national parks and monuments from your home.
The National Park Conservation Association also launched an interactive park platform called Park It!. The website offers all kinds of activities like self-printable coloring pages, videos, virtual visits, and trivia. It’s pretty cool to poke around and explore all kinds of park activities online.
View the NPF ToursVisit the Park It! Platform
If the NPS.gov tours don’t strike your fancy, check out Google’s 360-degree national park tours, like this one of Bryce Canyon National Park, where you can explore everything from rock formations to constellations in the night sky.
2. Celebrate With Art
This not only is a great way to celebrate national parks but helps out local artists and small businesses as well. Check out a few of our favorites below.
SubParParks: Artist Amber Share creates funny park poster designs based on one-star reviews of national parks. You can support her by ordering posters or stickers of your favorite design.
Jeremy Ashcroft Maps: U.K. illustrator Jeremy Ashcroft makes 3D maps and illustrations with some of the craziest detail we’ve seen — of landscapes across Yosemite, Zion, and Denali.
Fifty-Nine Parks Poster Series: Lastly, the Fifty-Nine Parks Series features designs and contributions from a mass of artists, and everything is printed in the USA. A portion of each purchase is donated to the National Park Service.
3. Celebrate Through Film
Check out this peaceful NPS video of a rare and empty Yosemite National Park or this short documentary about threatened national monuments.
If you’re looking for a full-length film, check out Zion’s newest park film, “We the Keepers,” which is free to watch for the entire week. If you’ve never been to Zion, you’ll get a great sense of the park and its community in this film.
4. Celebrate With Brands
Parks Project, a retailer dedicated to celebrating national parks, is launching several new collections this week. Parks Project has collaborated with brands like REI and groups like National Geographic, the Sierra Club, and Access Fund over the years to provide vital funding to our parks.
Or celebrate by participating in Hydro Flask’s Parks For All campaign, which chooses different park organizations and nonprofits to support each year.
Rumpl is another brand actively celebrating National Park Week with its new National Parks Collection. Prints of Grand Canyon and Yellowstone national parks will be featured on the brand’s original puffy blanket.
5. Celebrate With Support
Support nonprofits like the Sierra Club or National Park Foundation by donating or pledging to volunteer on a future project.
We do this to continually care for our parks until we can all get back out there and visit in person.
