Who the heck are you and what is this site for?
Hello! This website is a video log of my (Stephen) road trips over the past years. I'm a guy who likes to take road trips. I guess my main reason for this site is to archive all of my videos and organize them, but I also hope to provide a resource for people who are planning trips to national parks in the United States: to get some feedback from my videos about what to expect, what places to go, or what places not to go. Or, if you're just interested in watching videos involving hiking in Grand Canyon National Park, driving on the Beartooth Highway near Yellowstone National Park, or boating on Lake McDonald in Glacier National Park, this site may be able to help.

Is this site complete?
This site is still very much a work in progress, and I have nearly all of the 2011 videos annotated. The 2009, 2013, 2014, 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019 videos have titles, with annotations to come. 2010 has partial titles. Eventually, I want to add a commenting feature on each page.

What do you hope people get out of this site?
I hope this site provides some utility, edification, and/or just plain enjoyment.

Where do you go on your road trips and do you have any road trip goals?
I'm a huge fan of road trips to United States National Parks, as you probably can tell from looking at the videos of the road trips I've taken. There are 61 US National Parks, and my eventual goal is to visit the 49 of them in the contiguous 48 states. (I'd have to go to Alaska (8 National Parks), Hawaii (2), the Virgin Islands (1), and American Samoa (1) to visit the other 12. Who knows? Perhaps I will someday.)

Which "contiguous-48-states" US National Parks have you visited?
I've visited 42 of the 49. Here's a list, with the first year visited in parentheses:

Arches (2011)
Big Bend (2016)
Badlands (2010)
Black Canyon of the Gunnison (2016)
Bryce Canyon (2011)
Canyonlands (2011)
Capitol Reef (2011)
Carlsbad Caverns (1999)
Channel Islands (2017)
Congaree (2014)
Crater Lake (2019)
Death Valley (2010)
Glacier (2010)
Grand Canyon (1999)
Grand Teton (2009)
Great Basin (2011)
Great Sand Dunes (2011)
Great Smoky Mountains (1989?)
Guadalupe Mountains (1999)
Hot Springs (2013)
Isle Royale (2013)
Joshua Tree (2017)
Kings Canyon (2017)
Lassen Volcanic (2019)
Mammoth Cave (2013)
Mesa Verde (2011)
Mount Rainier (2019)
North Cascades (2019)
Olympic (2019)
Petrified Forest (2010)
Pinnacles (2017)
Redwood (2019)
Rocky Mountain (2016)
Saguaro (2016)
Sequoia (2017)
Shenandoah (2011)
Theodore Roosevelt (2013)
Voyageurs (2013)
Wind Cave (2010)
Yellowstone (2009)
Yosemite (2010)
Zion (2011)

Which "contiguous-48-states" US National Parks have you not visited?
I still have to visit 7 of the 49. I'm about three-quarters to my "Contiguous US National Park Goal." Here's a list:

Acadia
Biscayne
Cuyahoga Valley
Dry Tortugas
Everglades
Gateway Arch
Indiana Dunes

Can you show an embedded Google Map with color-coded markers for the US National Parks you have visited (green), ones you haven't visited and plan to visit (red), and ones you haven't visited and haven't planned to visit (blue)?

View Visited US National Parks in a larger map

Which "contiguous-48-states" US National Parks require boats or planes? (In other words, which ones are hard to access mainly by car?)
Biscayne (Florida), Channel Islands (California), Dry Tortugas (Florida), Isle Royale (Michigan), and Voyageurs (Minnesota) are all mostly water accessible. I've been to Voyageurs and you don't have to have a boat, although to see the park really well you need one (chartered, rental, etc.).

Which "contiguous-48-states" US National Parks are touching/joined?
To my knowledge, the only two that are actually touching (and also happen to be administered as one unit) are Kings Canyon and Sequoia. While Yellowstone and Grand Teton are within 5 miles or so, they are not touching. Carlsbad Caverns and Guadalupe Mountains are within 10 miles or so, but they not touching.

Can I see your road trip itineraries in spreadsheet form?
Here are the Google Docs planning spreadsheets that I used for my Road Trips. They correlate with the videos on this site.

2009 Road Trip ("Grand Canyon, Vegas, & Yellowstone")
2010 Road Trip ("Great National Parks of the West")
2011 Road Trip ("Utah's National Parks")
2013 Road Trip ("Eclectic National Parks of the West & Midwest")
2014 Road Trip ("Grand Canyon Hiking Week")
2016 Road Trip ("Southwest & Colorado's National Parks")
2017 Road Trip ("Southern California's National Parks")
2018 Road Trip ("Canyons & Arches")
2019 Road Trip ("Northern California & the Northwest")

How about United States National Monuments? Which ones have you been to?
As of mid-2019, there are 129 US National Monuments, and I do not plan to visit them all. However, here's a list of the ones I've been to (that I can recall...I may have been to a few others), including the year first visited. Keep in mind that a National Monument is essentially the same "status" and "protection level" as a US National Park, only usually smaller. Sometimes they're just as grand as some US National Parks.

Colorado (2016)
Craters of the Moon (2013)
Devil's Tower (2010)
Giant Sequoia (2017)
Grand Staircase-Escalante (2011)
Mount St. Helens Volcanic (2019)
Sunset Crater Volcano (2013)
White Sands (2016)

What camera/camcorder did you use to take the videos?
2019: Most videos were taken with a Sony FDRAX53. Most of these videos are in UHD (2160p 30fps) but some are in HD (1080p 60fps). Videos marked with "CELL" were taken with a Samsung Galaxy S7 (2160p 30fps).

2018: Most videos were taken with a Sony PJ260V. Some videos were taken with an IPhone 6S (1080p 30fps) and are marked with a "D" in the title.

2017: Most videos were taken with a Sony PJ260V. Videos marked with "CELL" were taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4 (1080p 30fps), and videos marked "HEADCAM" were taken with an Akaso EK7000 (1080p 60fps).

2016: All videos were taken with a Sony PJ260V.

2014: Similar to 2013 (see below), most videos were taken with a Sony PJ260V.

2013: The vast majority of the videos were taken with a Sony PJ260V camcorder (1080p 60fps resolution). The videos with "Dashcam" in the title were taken with a Canon SX150IS (720p 24fps), and the videos with "Headcam" in the title were taken with a Contour ROAM (1080p 30fps). A few videos were taken with the camera mainly used for photos, a Canon SX50HS (1080p 24fps). They're appropriately labeled.

2011 & 2010: Almost all of the 2010 and 2011 videos were taken with a Canon SX20IS (720p 30fps).

2009: All of the videos in 2009 were taken with a Canon S5IS (480p).

Do you have any tips on what camera/camcorder to use if I wish to record my road trip experiences?
If you're doing a solo road trip, I'd certainly get a camera/camcorder that has a rotating LCD so it's easy to take video/pictures of yourself if you wish. Not that your goal should be to take pictures of yourself, but if you want to take some it makes it simple. The Canon SX20IS and SX50HS (essentially different iterations of the same camera) both have that rotating LCD ability. Both of them are great cameras that also do video very well. The Sony PJ260V is a fantastic camcorder that also has a rotating LCD screen.

In my opinion, camcorders generally do not take photos as well as cameras take video. If you're looking for one do-it-all piece of photo-video capturing, the Canon SX50HS is a good choice (with a 50x optical zoom). However, the Sony PJ260V has a higher framerate (60p), arguably better video, as well as GPS tagging, so if your main focus is great video but don't want to break the bank, (<$300), then the PJ260V should be a consideration. The Sony FDRAX53 has excellent image stabilization and 4K @ 30fps, although it does not have GPS tagging and costs more than $500.

Where were each of the front page photos taken?
The 2018 shows a bird perched along the South Kaibab Trail of the Grand Canyon. The 2017 photo shows Yosemite Valley & Half Dome from Yosemite Point. The 2016 photo shows the Rio Grande River near Santa Elena Canyon (in Big Bend National Park). The 2014 photo shows Plateau Point at the South Rim of the Grand Canyon. The 2013 photo shows the rocky path to the 13,000-foot summit of Wheeler Peak (in Great Basin National Park) from about 12,000 feet. The 2011 photo shows the famous US-163 shot near Monument Valley where Forrest Gump stopped running. The 2010 photo shows Artist Drive in Death Valley National Park. The 2009 photo shows the highest point of the Blue Ridge Parkway at mile marker 431 on Richland Balsam Mountain. Finally, the FAQ/ photo shows the Grand Canyon from the South Rim's Bright Angel Trail (nearby the 1.5-mile resthouse's water spigot).

You took road trips in 2009, 2010, 2011, 2013, 2014, 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019. Why didn't you take a road trip in 2012 and 2015?
Seem like wasted years, don't they?

When was this site last updated?
This site is constantly being updated and added to as I continue to title and annotate all the videos, update features, make it more user friendly, etc. If you desire something more specific, mid 2019.

How can I contact you?
Questions? Comments? Concerns? I'd love to hear feedback, especially if this site helped you in any way.

You can e-mail me at zzwebmasterzz in the "roadtrp.org" domain, but make sure to remove those two sets of zz's. Or, my disposable forwarding e-mail (that will change frequently): [email protected]