North American Tours

Where Should I Stay Near Joshua Tree?

May 26, 2019 Bob Howells

This post is part of Just Ahead’s Joshua Tree Trip Planner—our guide to everything you need to know to plan your trip to Joshua Tree National Park. Click here to see the complete series, and be sure to download our Just Ahead smartphone audio tour of Joshua Tree before you head to the park.

Much as we love camping in Joshua Tree National Park, sometimes a roof and creature comforts are in order. The towns near and adjacent to the park offer everything from inns with character to traditional motels to quirky joints that don’t fall into any category.

We don’t endorse any places in particular, but a few local lodgings are notably famous:

What Are the 10 Best Sights in Joshua Tree?

May 25, 2019 Bob Howells

Naming the top 10 best sights in Joshua Tree National Park is like naming your favorite child, because we love every sandy, rocky, scrubby, wildflowery acre of Joshua Tree. But here we go anyway: a selection of our favorite places described in the Just Ahead tour of Joshua Tree National Park. Note: These are not in any particular order. Because remember, we love them all.

Barker Dam/Keys Lake, Joshua Tree National Park

Summer or winter rains bring an ephemeral lake to Joshua Tree at Barker Dam.

Just Ahead’s Rocky Mountain National Park Trip Planner

May 25, 2019 Bob Howells

Welcome to Just Ahead’s Rocky Mountain National Park trip planner—our guide to everything you need to know to plan your trip to Rocky Mountain. Click here to see the complete series, and be sure to download our Just Ahead smartphone audio tour of Rocky Mountain before you head to the park. We’ll guide you to and through the park and all its scenic wonders.

What do you need to know to plan a trip to Rocky Mountain National Park? For starters: where to camp, where to stay, and the best sights to see. We spell it all out in our Rocky Mountain Trip Planner.

Bighorn sheep near Rock Cut, Rocky Mountain National Park. NPS photo by Ann Schonlau.

We also urge you to visit the Rocky Mountain National Park website for more details, and for the latest information on road conditions in the park. Although the park is open all year, its signature road, Trail Ridge Road, is generally closed due to snowfall from mid-October until late May.

What Are the Best Sights in Rocky Mountain National Park?

May 25, 2019 Bob Howells

This post is part of Just Ahead’s Rocky Mountain National Park trip planner—our guide to everything you need to know to plan your trip to Rocky Mountain. Click here to see the complete series, and be sure to download our Just Ahead smartphone audio tour of Rocky Mountain before you head to the park. We’ll guide you to and through the park and all its scenic wonders.

Determining the best sights in Rocky Mountain National Park is a subjective exercise. The park is stunningly beautiful everywhere you look. Whether you simply drive through or spend several days hiking the park, you’ll no doubt create your own list. Here’s ours, though: the top 10 sights in Rocky Mountain National Park. (Actually, these are the top 11, if you’re counting; we couldn’t help ourselves.)

Trail Ridge Road
Since several of the don’t-miss sights in Rocky Mountain National Park are on or near Trail Ridge Road, the road itself is obviously one of the park’s standout attractions. Trail Ridge Road is one of the most scenic routes in the United States, as well as the country’s highest continuous paved road—in other words, the highest route that doesn’t simply ascend to a dead end. Along the way to the road’s summit at 12,183 feet, you climb from foothills covered in ponderosa pine to spruce-fir forests to the alpine tundra above timberline. Just before Trail Ridge Road opened in 1932, Horace Albright, director of the National Park Service, described it by saying, “You will have the whole sweep of the Rockies before you in all directions.”

Trail Ridge Road is generally open from late May to mid-October. Check the park’s Road Status Report for the latest details.

Best Sights in Rocky Mountain National Park

Longs Peak (14,259 feet) is the park’s highest summit. The hike to the top is very challenging. A superb alternative is the day hike to beautiful Chasm Lake at the mountain’s base. NPS photo by Crystal Brindle.

Longs Peak
When a mountain rises 14,259 feet high, you can be certain that it’s visible from many places. Such is the case with Longs Peak, tallest summit in Rocky Mountain National Park, and the park’s only fourteener. You can see it from the town of Estes Park, from the treeless tundra surrounding Tundra Communities Trail, from Mountain Overlook, and from many other places that we call out during your Just Ahead tour of the park. Quite often you’ll see Longs Peak’s neighbor, Mount Meeker (13,911 feet), in the same view. Thousands of hikers climb Longs Peak each year, but it requires a strenuous 15-mile round trip. And excellent alternative is the 8.4-mile round trip to Chasm Lake. At the base of the sheer north face of Longs Peak, the lake offers an alpine scene as memorable as any in the park.

Elk
Rocky Mountain is rife with wildlife and wildlife-viewing opportunities. Elk are the most noble and charismatic of the animals you are likely to see. It’s impossible to forget the sight of a big male, weighing close to half a ton, and his huge, spreading antlers. Elk roam widely throughout the park, feeding at high elevations in summer and moving down to lower valleys in fall. In autumn, the males’ calls echo around the park. In summer, you may see elk along Trail Ridge Road. In fall, watch for them early and late in the day around the edges of meadows and grassy valleys, particularly in Horseshoe Park and Moraine Park. Just Ahead will, of course, steer you to the best places to see these magnificent animals.

Where Should I Stay in Rocky Mountain National Park?

May 25, 2019 Bob Howells

This post is part of Just Ahead’s Rocky Mountain National Park Trip Planner—our guide to everything you need to know to plan your trip to Rocky Mountain. Click here to see the complete series, and be sure to download our Just Ahead smartphone audio tour of Rocky Mountain before you head to the park.

Unlike most large national parks, Rocky Mountain has no in-park lodging. So where to stay in Rocky Mountain? Your best bets are its two gateway towns—Estes Park to the east and Grand Lake to the west. Both offer plenty of options, and it’s simple enough to commute from the towns into the heart of the park. To give you some sense of scale, Estes Park is 24 miles from the Alpine Visitor Center near the summit of Trail Ridge Road in the heart of the park. Grand Lake is 22 miles from the Alpine Visitor Center. Remember, Just Ahead guides you to and from both towns and throughout Rocky Mountain National Park.

Lodging in Estes Park
Estes Park, just east of Rocky Mountain National Park, is best known for the Stanley Hotel. The historic and distinctive 1909 lodge is best known for having inspired Stephen King’s novel The Shining. Contrary to rumor, the film of the same name was not filmed in the Stanley.

Where to stay in Rocky Mountain National Park: The Stanley Hotel

The Stanley Hotel in Estes Park

Estes Park has many other offerings, ranging from rustic cabins to luxurious inns. For a complete list, visit the Estes Park lodging website.

Where Should I Camp in Rocky Mountain National Park?

May 25, 2019 Bob Howells

Where to camp in Rocky Mountain National Park? The park is uniformly gorgeous, so all of its campgrounds have the woodsy mountain beauty you’d expect. All of the campgrounds are extremely popular in the park’s summer high season, so be sure to make reservations (details below) or arrive early in the morning for the sites that are first-come, first-served. For more details and for rules and regulations, visit the park’s website.

East Side of Rocky Mountain National Park

Aspenglen Campground
Located on US 34 just west of the Fall River entrance station (within walking distance), Aspenglen Campground has 53 sites, many of which accommodate RVs up to 30 feet. Aspenglen Campground has a unique facility—privacy stalls where you can hang your own solar shower. It’s generally open from late May to late September. Reservations are available through recreation.gov.

Glacier Basin Campground
This large, 150-site campground, is on Bear Lake Road about six miles south of the Beaver Meadows entrance station. It’s generally open from early July into the fall. Sites are available for tents and RVs up to 35 feet. Reservations are available through recreation.gov.

Longs Peak Campground
This small, 26-site campground is for tents only and does not accept reservations. All sites are first-come, first served. Located just of US 7 south of the town of Estes Park, it’s a great location for hikers eager to take on the tough hike up Longs Peak (14,259). Generally open during the summer months only.

Black Hills & Mount Rushmore—and Badlands National Park—Are Just Ahead’s Newest Audio Travel Guides

July 27, 2016 Bob Howells

The Black Hills of South Dakota—including Mount Rushmore—and nearby Badlands National Park are the sites of Just Ahead’s most recent smartphone audio guides. Both audio tours guide travelers to and through some of America’s most scenic roads and historic landscapes.

Great Smoky Mountains National Park: Just Ahead’s Newest Audio Guide

June 6, 2016 Bob Howells

Just Ahead’s newest guide leads you through Great Smoky Mountains National Park, a park perfectly suited to a Just Ahead smartphone audio tour. Superb roads wind through its densely forested mountains, revealing vistas that stretch across ridge after ridge, each gently softened by the natural haze that accounts for the “smoky” in Great Smoky Mountains. america-219896_1280

All you need to do is turn on the app and drive. As you approach the park’s sights, Just Ahead tells you exactly what you’re seeing.

Visit Petrified Forest National Park With Just Ahead

February 3, 2016 Bob Howells

Old-Fashioned Travel the New-Fashioned Way

Petrified Forest National Park in northern Arizona is a compact park that you could drive through, if you wanted to, in less than an hour. But with Just Ahead’s audio tour of the park loaded into your smartphone, you’ll want to spend at least half a day there, soaking in the beauty and fascinating stories of this small but amazing desert park.

NPS Photo

It’s a perfect setting for the Just Ahead formula. Sights you’d otherwise whiz by suddenly spring to life when our narration points them out, explains what you’re seeing, and urges you to hop out of the car and have a closer look.

In the course of Just Ahead’s tour of Petrified Forest National Park, you’ll learn how trees become petrified, and where to see the most stunning examples of petrified wood. You’ll explore archeological treasures such as Agate House—a building nearly 1,000 years old made entirely of petrified wood. We’ll steer you to short hikes where you can see weird badlands and odd stone formations that look like giant teepees.

Just Ahead Among Top 5 Travel Apps in USA Today Poll

December 17, 2015 Bob Howells

Another honor has come our way! Just Ahead has been voted one of the top five new travel apps for 2015 in a USA Today Readers’ Choice poll. Just Ahead was selected as one of 20 nominees for the honor by a panel of experts that included editors from USA Today, expert contributors to the newspaper, and sources from other Gannett media outlets. (Gannett owns USA Today as well as 81 local newspapers and 43 television stations). After the nominees were announced, readers had four weeks during which to vote. When the results were announced on December 11, Just Ahead was among the top five winners.

The expert nominating panel cited Just Ahead’s ability to “transform phones into a GPS tour guide. Using GPS, the app narrates notable scenery along the way and shares info as travelers drive through certain parts of the country. They can hear stories, tips, and facts about the sights they drive past.”

The honor rounded out a year during which Just Ahead was also named Best Travel App by the North American Travel Journalists Association, and Best App in Sunset magazine’s Best of the West special section in the June issue of that magazine.

For us here at Just Ahead, the results show once again that what we’re delivering resonates with travelers. By offering audio tours of national parks and scenic highways via smartphone, we bring great destinations to life. We inform, entertain, and guide readers to rich experiences of inspiring places.

We’re proud and humbled that our product has been so warmly received!

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East Side of Rocky Mountain National Park