Spectacular Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks - Hardcover

Preston, Charles; Robbins, Jim

4.37

19 ratings by Goodreads

9780789399946: Spectacular Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0789399946 ISBN 13: 9780789399946

Publisher: Universe, 2008

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Spectacular Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks captures the breathtaking landscape and wildlife of one of America’s most renowned regions. More than 275 photographs—from some of the country's best nature photographers—recreate the adventure and grandeur of this area that combines the world's greatest collection of geothermal features, some of the West's most spectacular mountains and its best wildlife viewing areas. This unique large-format book offers guided tours—in words and pictures—of Yellowstone and Grand Teton, with thirty-six pages of foldouts, each more than three feet wide, designed to illustrate the wide-open expanse of these national park gems. Yellowstone was set aside as America's first national park in 1872. Since then, interest in the park has grown dramatically and today, more than 3 million people visit the two parks annually. Grand Teton National Park, home of the majestic mountain range, was preserved as a national park in 1929. This book offers stunning photographs of every corner of the 2.2 million acres that make up these parks, including such treasures as Lake Yellowstone, the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone River, and the world's most famous geyser, Old Faithful, as well as rainbow-colored geyser basins of the north Mammoth country, and herds of buffalo and elk on the wide plains of the Lamar Valley. Sit back and behold the beauty of the Grand Tetons at sunset, the breathtaking vistas over the Snake River, or the refreshing waterfalls off the Bechler River trail. Whether it’s boating on Jackson Lake or a hike around Grand Prismatic Spring that you desire, Spectacular Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks takes you deep into the parks' many gorgeous landscapes in every season of the year.

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About the Author:

Charles Preston is the chief curator at the Buffalo Bill Historical Center.

Jim Robbins is a journalist, specializing in environmental issues.

Susan Kraft is a freelance writer and the former curator of Yellowstone Park Museum and Archives.

Lee Whittlesey is a Yellowstone Park historian.

Letitia Burns O’Connor is an editor and freelance writer.

Review:

Spectacular Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks Mar 31, 2008 This stunning new collection of expansive, mind-opening photographs and illuminating essays richly conveys the wild wonders -- and complex challenges -- of two renowned national parks.

Yellowstone and Grand Teton. For the casual traveler, these words evoke the wild grandeur of the Old West - the wide-open West of shark-tooth peaks, skyscraping geysers, snaking rivers, plunging waterfalls and lush pristine valleys, and of course free-roaming bison and wolf, elk and bear. For the better informed traveler, these words also evoke a complicated interconnection of wilderness and civilization, conservation and cultivation, preservation and exploitation, resource and reward: an iconic exemplar of the potentials and problems of sustaining wilderness in the 21st century.

An extraordinarily beautiful and informative new book, "Spectacular Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks" poignantly portrays the exhilarating splendors of these two national parks and the daunting array of challenges confronting them.

The book begins with an excellent essay, by Charles R. Preston, which cogently reviews the history of the region and introduces the notion of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, then succinctly summarizes the key issues that have shaped its evolution. Five succeeding chapters by Susan Kraft and Letitia Burns O'Connor focus on individual areas and attractions of Yellowstone National Park: Mammoth Hot Springs, the Geyser Basins, the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, Lamar Valley, and Yellowstone Lake. O'Conner then describes the history and highlights of Grand Teton National Park. The edifying final chapter, "Elements of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem," by Jim Robbins, uses the four elements -- fire, water, air and earth - to delineate the lessons of the region.

While these texts are all enlightening, the real glory of this book is the more than 275 photographs, many of them stunning, which brilliantly portray the diversity of the region's natural features and wild creatures. Prime among the book's visual treasures are 36 pages of three-foot-wide foldout photographs that exquisitely illustrate the region's expansive glories.

The pictures and essays in "Spectacular Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks" are gifts to cherish - as are the national treasures they celebrate.

[Spectacular Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks; text and photographs by various contributors; published by Universe Publishing, a division of Rizzoli International Publications, Inc; copyright 2007 Dana Levy and Letitia Burns O'Conner; hardcover, 132 pages; $45.]

The following Adventure Collection members offer trips to the Yellowstone and Grand Teton region: Backroads, Natural Habitat Adventures, NOLS, OARS, and Off the Beaten Path. -- written by Don George for Adventure Collection, donsplace.adventurecollection.com/bookshelf.php

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