Best Canine Hike In A National Park
Somehow Canada allows dogs on the trail in some of the most magnificent national parks on the planet while handling millions of visitors each year and protecting wildlife. Not so in the United States. Rather than dwell on the disaster zone that most American national parks are for dog owners let’s move swiftly to the meager list of nominees in this category...
Acadia National Park (Maine)
Great Head Trail
Acadia was the first national park created east of the Mississippi River and the first one that used donated private land. It no doubt helped future canine hikers that it would not have been a good look to ban the dogs of prominent donor families - primarily the dog-loving Rockefellers who brought some the earliest Bullmastiffs to America - from the park. So today there are over 100 miles of foot trails and 45 miles of carriage paths open to dogs at “the Crown Jewel of the North Atlantic Coast.” Acadia’s Great Head Trail delivers those shiny ocean views in a 1.7-mile loop that includes time in a fragrant spruce-fir boreal forest.
Congaree National Park (South Carolina)
Boardwalk Loop
Congaree National Park protects the largest contiguous area of old-growth bottomland hardwood forest remaining in the United States. More than 52 million acres of floodplain forests have been decimated in the southeastern United States in the past century making Congaree’s 2,000 acres of virgin pine, tupelo and bald cypress special indeed. The park’s forests harbor 20 state or national champion trees including loblolly pines, hickories and bald cypress under one of the highest deciduous roofs in the world. Your dog can enjoy it all, beginning with the marquee 2.4-mile Boardwalk Loop and step down for woodland rambles along the Congaree River.
Cuyahoga Valley National Park (Ohio)
Ledges Trail
Raise your hand if you knew that America’s first national park of the 21st Century was created in..............Cleveland? To the first people who came here 12,000 years ago the Cuyahoga was the “crooked river.” As befits its history as a recreation destination, Cuyahoga permits dogs on its trails. It doesn’t have the feel of the grand American national parks but instead evokes an intimate local park feel that will suite your best trail companion just fine. The Ledges Trail highlights the area’s unique geology as it circles the imposing rock formations on a wide footpath for over two miles. Spur trails climb to the nooks and crannies and the top of the ledges, often with stone steps to ease your dog’s journey.
Grand Canyon National Park (Arizona)
South Rim Trail
This is our only nominee from the great Western national parks so indelibly etched in our imaginations. When Theodore Roosevelt visited as President in 1903 he took his best oratorical shot by saying, “The Grand Canyon fills me with awe. It is beyond comparison - beyond description.” He concluded by stating that the handiwork of the Colorado River is “the one great sight which every American should see.” Your American dog can indeed see the Grand Canyon but is not allowed below the rim, the grandeur comes from the 14 miles of trail that snakes along the South Rim.
Mammoth Cave National Park (Kentucky)
Green River Bluffs Trail
Not named for extinct wooly elephants, Mammoth Cave earns its chops as the world’s longest known cave system with more than 400 miles of passages mapped, so many that the guides like to point out that you could put the second and third longest caves systems inside the limestone labyrinth and have more than 100 miles left over. Your dog will have to be content with the dark hollows and hardwood forests above ground. The Green River Bluffs Trail meanders through the thick canopy to a promontory above the eponymous river and ties into a complex of other easy-trotting paths. The route also leads to the Historic Entrance of the great cave that will deliver a blast of cold air onto your curious dog’s nose.
And the Waggie Award for Best Canine Hike In A National Park goes to...Acadia National Park!
When you put the Grand Canyon in a category it’s awful hard to give the award to anyone else but, hey, Meryl Streep doesn’t win every year she’s nominated either. The Great Head Trail loops across secluded Sand Beach on Newport Cove - dogs are welcome on the sand and for a dip in the ocean except in the summer - and most canine hikers go right at the head of the loop. But going left into the maritime forest saves the spectacular coastal views from one of America’s highest headlands until the end. This land was once owned by financier J.P. Morgan who gave it to his daughter, Louisa Satterlee. She constructed a stout stone tea house tower in 1915 at the highest point of Great Head, 145 feet above the waves. A fire damaged the tower in 1947 and destroyed three adjacent bungalows so the land was donated to the park shortly afterwards. The remains of the foundation are still seen on the hike. Lurking above Sand Beach at the beginning is the 520-foot Beehive with its exposed cliffs. The wide path into the forest is paw-friendly as it winds through white birch tree trunks and dark spruce conifers. Once atop the cliffs the going is mostly level with surprises for your dog around every crag as the trail picks its way along blue lines above the crashing ocean. With stops to watch seals and harbor porpoises this stretch of the canine hike can take some time.