23 Awe-Inspiring Records Held by US National Parks

America , the unquestioned human beings whizz of declare it ’s the world champion , can truly take the most fantastic public lands on the planet . One of the institute fathers of our national parks , Teddy Roosevelt , laid down the skag when he urged Congress to protect a ruddy dapple of the Southwest . " In the Grand Canyon , " he adjudge , " Arizona has a natural wonder which is in kind absolutely alone throughout the rest of the public . " America ’s national parks : the hottest on the planet since 1872 .

For more than a 100 , Americans have been locking their most sterling natural features for future generations – the biggest , the tallest , the deepest , the old , the flat - out coolest . Here we ’ve scrub the 58 parks under the National Park Service ( happy 100th this summer , y' all ! ) and pulled out some of the freakiest records from within .

World’s largest living tree

Sequoia National ParkCaliforniaThe General Sherman heavyweight sequoia stands 271 ft tall and weighs more than 4 million pounds . Truly in a class of its own .

Lowest point in the Western Hemisphere

Death Valley National ParkCaliforniaBadwater Basin sits 282 ft below ocean level . Curiously , it ’s a mere 76 miles from the Sierra Nevada mountain with the high elevation in the contiguous United States : Mount Whitney ( 14,505 ft ) .

Hottest world temperature ever recorded

Death Valley National ParkCaliforniaA blistering 132 - degree temperature was recorded at appropriately make Furnace Creek on July 10th , 1913 .

World’s largest block of granite

Yosemite National ParkCaliforniaEl Capitan put up nearly 3,000 foot tall , attract rock climbers from around the humans , and is one of the mostscenic shoes in Yosemite .

America’s deepest cave

Carlsbad Caverns National ParkNew MexicoThe deep cave in this park reach 1,593 ft into the earth – virtually a third of a mile .

America’s deepest lake

Crater Lake National ParkOregonThis volcanic - formed lake is 1,943 ft cryptic , which could inundate the Empire State Building 700 ft deep . One of the the deep lake in the world , it ’s also themost beautiful place in Oregon .

Highest point in North America, world’s tallest mountain from base to peak

Denali National ParkAlaskaDenali ( née Mount McKinley ) stands at 20,310 ft , the highest point in North America . Its summit is n’t the world ’s high – you could find a hundred Himalayas taller – but its rise from fundament to summit is the tallest of any above - sea mountain in the macrocosm .

Oldest non-clonal organism ever discovered

Great Basin National ParkNevadaIn 1964 , a grad scholarly person recover a gnarly , 17ft - tall bristlecone pine tree that seemed representative of the older trees in a particular plantation . With the helper of the US Forest Service , he abbreviate it down , carved it loose – and found , a flake embarrassingly , that it was about5,000years honest-to-god . Prometheus , as the Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree came to be know , had been the oldest continually living thing on the planet , a form of address that passed unceremoniously to something else once the one-time pine was felled .

Most geysers in the world

Yellowstone National ParkMontana / Wyoming / IdahoYou like geysers ? Yellowstone has 500 active ones , about half the earthly concern ’s supply .

World’s tallest active geyser

Yellowstone National ParkWyomingWith that many candidates , it ’s no surprise Yellowstone win this family . Steamboat , in the Norris Geyser Basin , erupts to a height of 300 ft .

World’s longest known cave system

Mammoth Cave National ParkKentuckyMore than 400 miles of caves have been mapped . And that ’s just so far – we ’re nowhere near the end .

World’s tallest collection of trees

Redwood National ParkCaliforniaThe tree in this Mungo Park can unfold up to 30 stories eminent . The mavin of the show is the 370 ft Stratosphere Giant , which until 2006 hold the disk for world ’s tallest Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree . It has been outgo by Hyperion ( 378 ft ) , Helios ( 373 foot ) , and Icarus ( 371 foot ) in Eureka , California .

World’s largest natural bridge

Rainbow Bridge National MonumentUtahThe Rainbow Bridge stand 290 ft grandiloquent and stretches 2,575 ft wide . And it does cross water : the aptly name Bridge Creek , which write out this sandstone marvel over eon .

World’s most active volcano

Hawai’i Volcanoes National ParkHawaiiKilauea has been erupting incessantly since 1960 . Judging by seismic activeness , it has been going through one openhanded , prolonged eructation passably much since 1983 .

World’s tallest active volcano, world’s tallest mountain

Hawai’i Volcanoes National ParkHawaiiMauna Loa ’s summit is at 13,796 ft above sea grade , giving it the title of tallest vent in the world . But its foot is another 19,685ftbelowsea level . If you do the math that totals about 33,500 ft , making it the largest sight in the worldly concern . ( And that does n’t count a standardised depth to which the mass ’s peck has depressed the crust beneath it . To genuinely reach the bottom of the mountain , you ’d have to travel more than 10 naut mi down from its peak . )

America’s largest barrier reef

Dry Tortugas National ParkFloridaBecause this ballpark off Key West isso often overlooked , the coral reef at the end of the 300 - land mile Florida reef are largely unobstructed . The Rand is also the fifth - largest in the human beings and the secondly - largest in the Western Hemisphere , behind the Mesoamerican Reef in Belize .

North America’s tallest waterfall

Yosemite National ParkCaliforniaYosemite Falls post water down five steep plunges and a series of cascades – a drop curtain of a singular 2,425 foot .

World’s largest density of sandstone arches

Arches National ParkUtahInside just 120 square miles , the commons boasts more than 2,000 sandstone arch , some as tall as 300 ft .

World’s largest gypsum dune fields

White Sands National MonumentNew MexicoThe soft , white , sandy dunes straggle across 275 solid mile , an area the size of Singapore .

Largest ice field entirely in the United States

Kenai Fjords National ParkAlaskaThe Harding Icefield spans some 700 square mile ( for now ) and has been cover this division of South - Central Alaska for about 23,000 old age .

World’s largest collection of boxwork

Wind Cave National ParkSouth DakotaWhile most cave are characterized by stalactites and stalagmites , Wind Cave is full of crack - rare boxwork formations , a sort of entanglement of rock latticework that extend over the interior of the cave . Roughly 95 % of the boxwork in the worldly concern can be found at Wind Cave , which at 143 mi long is also the sixth - large cave in the world . In 1903 Teddy Roosevelt established it as the 7th US internal Mungo Park , the first cave in the world to make the designation .

North America’s tallest sand dunes

keen Sand Dunes National ParkColoradoAt 700 ft grandiloquent , you might think these are n’t nearly as impressive as some of the nearby Rocky Mountains . Until you endeavor to rise them .

And our personal favorite …

Most lightning-struck man in history

Shenandoah National ParkVirginiaFormer park forest fire fighter Roy Sullivan has been strike by lightning an unconvincing SEVEN TIMES . And live . He even claims an eighth bang as a youngster , but no matter what , it ’s stilla man book . No word on whether he also plays the drawing .

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Crater Lake Oregon