Hello, New Year

Every year about this time, we at the Lodge at Red River Ranch like to take a moment to look back at the last 12 months. Sometimes it’s exciting to see how far we’ve come, or what has happened, or how we’ve changed in the past year. But this year, it’s a little more sobering. Still, there are a couple things that we’d like to talk about as we look back at 2020. And a couple of things we’d like to say thanks for.

Rangers made it possible to visit the parks in 2020. Photo by Danika Perkinson via unsplash.com

Everything Changed in the Parks. So Thank a Ranger.

This hasn’t been a normal year. And anybody who visited the national parks in 2020 knows how the much things have changed. For a while, during the early spring, all five of Utah’s national parks shut down. And when they did open back up again in May, new protocols were in place to help keep everyone safe. Tickets and advanced bookings became the norm, park programs and ranger discussions were canceled or moved online, and certain high-traffic areas of individual parks were shut-off to reduce crowding. Still, despite it all, record numbers of people traveled to the national parks, looking for a place to get outside, out of city-lockdowns, and into some fresh air.

We owe a lot to the the men and women of the National Park Service who made it possible to visit the parks this year. They had to deal with limited resources, new protocols, reduced staff, and large park visitor-ship. So if you see a park ranger in the coming year, be sure to thank them for keeping things running, against the odds, in 2020.

We need our public lands more than ever. Photo by Joshua Sukoff via unsplash.com

We Needed the Parks More Than Ever.

In our time of national crisis, we went to the national parks. There is, we think, something psychologically soothing in nature, something that we innately seek during times of stress and uncertainty. So it’s a great relief that we have a national park system to rely on. And as we look forward to the year ahead, which will no doubt have its own share of stress and uncertainty, we at the Lodge at Red River Ranch are grateful for the public lands where we can find beauty, fresh air, and comfort.

To those who have created, promoted, worked at, or in any way helped found and run our system of public lands we say thank you. It was a great help in 2020, and we hope it’ll be a great help in future years, and to future generations.