When the United States entered the Second World War, Alaska became an important strategic hub for military operations in the Pacific, and for the transport of U.S.-built war planes to the Soviet Union for use on the eastern front. This required a considerable amount of petroleum that had to be shipped from the U.S. West Coast to Alaska, and the U.S. Army was concerned this shipping route was…

When Anchorage officials and outdoor recreation advocates gathered Saturday to ceremoniously mark the start of construction for a 1.3-mile section of trail near the city’s industrial port, they said they were taking a small step toward a big vision. The connector will close a gap in the city’s existing network of paved bike trails and, […]

The "Hole in the Wall" area, in the middle of the Mojave National Preserve, contains photogenic tuff units, volcanic rocks that were formed, not by a flow of molten lava, but by the settling out of individual particles from a cloud of volcanic ash. If the particles are hot enough to stick together, the result is a "welded" tuff. That's what's happened here. The welding is uneven, so that the less…

The Colorado Boy Mine sits high on a steep hillside, visible from the Million Dollar Highway far below, but almost no one hikes up to see it close-up.

It features one of only three intact wooden vertical shaft houses left standing from the 1880s silver and gold rush era out of dozens that once stood. This rare survivor is a powerful symbol of the frontier mining life that once filled these…

Along a trail in the woods of southern Illinois, the pathway suddenly tightens. This is One Horse Gap, a natural corridor carved into the sandstone bedrock of Shawnee National Forest.

The name hints at its dimensions. The passage is so constricted that, historically, it was said only a single horse could pass through at a time. The rock walls rise steeply on either side, creating a cool, shaded…

About 30 miles north of Baker, California, on State Route 127, is an unexpected occurrence: a flowing creek. Salt Creek rises in the Silurian Valley to the south, toward Soda Lake, and flows northward into the Amargosa River as the latter makes a hairpin bend into the southern end of Death Valley. Because the area is extremely arid, both Salt Creek and the Amargosa River flow mostly…

This route that used to be the same taken by Houston’s first electrified streetcar system that would take the Heights neighborhood residents to the "big city"( until the 1940's), now for about two miles in between the northbound and southbound lanes on Heights Blvd shows you a world of wonder.

Every half mile or so you will be greeted with an open-air exhibit of works from various Texas…