Making foreigners pay more for national park visits

That's the story, per the Beeb.

Note that three states will be most hit, because relatively few US national parks are unique.

Europeans can see Yellowstone's geysers in Iceland and bison in the wisent of Poland, for example. They can stay at home for the Alps instead of the Rockies. Chinese and other Asians can do Banff instead of the Rockies, and there are plenty of waterfalls, in a couple of exceptions I'm about to note, in Europe and Asia.

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There's only one Grand Canyon, and only one saguaro cactus, and both are in Arizona. I'm not sure how much foreign visitation Saguaro NP gets, and Tucson has other attractions, but Tusayan et al losing foreign visitors to the Grand Canyon would be big.

Many canyon visitors also do one or more of Utah's Mighty Five, and like with the Grand Canyon, the small towns in this area might be affected.

In the Pacific Northwest, Olympic's temperate rain forest and Crater Lake's starkness are semi-unique, but not biggies.

Further south? California's Redwoods, in the combined state and national parks, the giant sequoias in that national park, the all-around beauty of Yosemite Valley, and especially for Germans, it seems, the starkness of Death Valley all are special.

The parks that will have a steep hike in per-park fees for foreign visitors without a fee-hiked foreign Parks Pass? Acadia National Park, Bryce Canyon National Park, Everglades National Park, Glacier National Park, Grand Canyon National Park, Grand Teton National Park, Rocky Mountain National Park, Sequoia & Kings Canyon National Parks, Yellowstone National Park, Yosemite National Parks, and Zion National Park.

So, we have Grand Canyon, two of the California parks, and two of Utah's Mighty Five. Why Arches isn't on the list I have no idea.

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That said, just days after The Donald announced this, The Louvre said it was more than doubling the admission cost for non-EU visitors. So, it's not like this is unique, or in terms of Trump-world, that bad. That said, he's just trying to soak visitors. He doesn't actually care about national parks and monuments; we already know that. 

Democrats care about the system somewhat more than Republicans, but not THAT much more. After all, they gave us

You think U.S. environmental enforcement is lax at times? BC sucks up to BP

Try living in British Columbia, where the provincial government is set to sign off on a coal-mining and natural gas exploration project next to both U.S. Glacier National Park and Canada’s Waterton Lakes National Park.

Together, they comprise the Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park, which is listed by the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) as one of its world heritage site.

Both the Canadian and US parks also have been declared by UNESCO to be Biosphere Reserves. World heritage sites are said to have outstanding cultural or natural importance to the common heritage of all humankind.

Critics also say the mining project runs the risk of spoiling the pristine waters and fragile ecosystem of parks on both the Canadian and US sides of the Rocky Mountains, which have come to symbolize peace and friendship between the two countries.

Chief among environmentalists' concerns are the impact on the area's abundant wildlife, including lynx, wolves and especially grizzly bears, whose mating habits could be adversely impacted by the noisy and intrusive mining equipment.

The company involved? British Beyond Petroleum; obviously moving so greenly beyond petroleum into dirty coal mining.

The natural gas will come from the same coal-bed methane that has dirtied up Wyoming’s Powder River country.

Despite the provincial government’s claims that neither national park has anything to worry about, an international commission recommended against a similar project back in 1988.

Grizzly attacks, three days after I was there

As I mentioned in the post immediately below this, among the places I was recently on vacation was Glacier National Park.

Now I see that two people were attacked there by a grizzly just three days after I was in the same area.

The National Park Service has said it will interview the two after they have recuperated. However, I am guessing they surprised the bear, and did not take adequate precautions to guard against surprise, such as talking, whistling or making noise on the trail, wearing bear bells, or doing something similar.

The majority of grizzly attacks, such as this one, are usually by a sow, and one with cubs. They are quite likely to attack when startled like this, in defense of their cubs.

I was at Many Glacier myself Aug. 22, three days before this attack. I did not hike down the trail they did, which trailheads at Many Glacier, because it was late in the day and because I saw grizzlies at about 400 yards above the lodge on a hillside.

Both regretfully (the photographer in me) and perhaps fortunately, that was my closest encounter.

I did see mountain goats close enough to pet and wolves at 800 yards in Yellowstone. I’ll post pictures in a couple of days.

Incidentally, beestings, lightning strikes and snakebite will all kill as many or more people in the United States each year. Yet, lightning is not even a living being, and the other two don’t evoke traditional predator images.