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加利福尼亚州雷斯岬国家海岸上的柏树隧道 The cypress tunnel at Point Reyes National Seashore in California (© Rachid Dahnoun/Tandem Stills + Motion)

The ‘Night of Nights'

This is the cypress tunnel at Point Reyes National Seashore, a nature preserve on the California coast north of San Francisco. The tunnel leads to KPH, a ship-to-shore radio station that once broadcast and received messages with marine craft in the Pacific. KPH stopped operations in 1997, as more sophisticated radio equipment and satellite communications made radio stations like it obsolete. Now it's one of the unusual features of Point Reyes, open to visitors interested in a glimpse of the past.

Tonight, the radio station will be full of Morse code and maritime radio enthusiasts, celebrating the anniversary of the ‘Night of Nights.' It was on July 12, 1999 that nearby station KFS sent what is thought to be the last commercial transmission of Morse code in the United States.

从上布法罗荒野地区的惠特克顶小道向东看，阿肯色州奥沙克国家森林 (© Jens Lambert Photography/Getty Images Plus)

The Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas © Eddie Brady/Getty Images

World-class art comes to Arkansas

Bentonville, Arkansas is probably not the first place that comes to mind when you think about visiting a world-class art museum. But Crystal Bridges is a new must-see in the art world. Its collection includes paintings, sculpture, photography, drawing, and installation art from colonial times to today and features American artists such as Maya Lin, Andrew Wyeth, Jacob Lawrence, Jackson Pollock, and Georgia O'Keeffe. But perhaps the biggest piece of art is the museum itself. Designed by Moshe Safdie, the building blends seamlessly and beautifully into the surrounding Ozark landscape. In addition to the art and architecture collections, there are eight nature trails on the grounds. And admission to the museum is always free.

位于大本德国家公园的格兰德河和卡门山脉，得克萨斯州 Rio Grande and Sierra del Carmen Mountains in Big Bend National Park, Texas (© Grant Ordelheide/Tandem Stills + Motion)

A big birthday for Big Bend

Seventy-five years ago today, on June 12, 1944, Big Bend officially became a US national park. The park, which covers 801,163 acres in West Texas, along the Mexico border, contains mountain, river, and desert ecosystems, including the largest protected area of the Chihuahuan Desert in the United States. But the ‘big’ doesn't stop there. Big Bend is home 1,200 species of plants, over 450 species of birds, 75 species of mammals, and 56 species of reptiles. (We're not sure how many of those are snakes, if you're wondering.) Because of its remote location, Big Bend also has among the darkest skies ever measured in the contiguous US. So tonight, the only light you'll likely see is the glow from 75 birthday candles—and a few million stars.

爱荷华州中部的高架栈桥 The High Trestle Trail Bridge in central Iowa (© Kelly van Dellen/Getty Images Plus)

Hiking the High Trestle Trail

The unique 130-foot-tall bridge you see here is just a small part of a longer, 25-mile trail that connects five small towns in central Iowa. The High Trestle Trail is a rail trail—a decommissioned railroad track that’s been turned into a multiuse trail—and it follows the path of an old Union Pacific Railroad freight line. The rail-to-trail movement began in the 1960s when many railroad tracks began to be removed and people noted that the relatively flat rail corridors were perfect for hiking and biking trails. We can now enjoy thousands of miles of rail trails throughout the US. So today, on National Trails Day, find a trail near you and get outside to celebrate.

俄勒冈州Zumwalt Prairie的草原土墩 Prairie mounds at Oregon’s Zumwalt Prairie (© Michael Durham/Minden Pictures)

Mysterious prairie mounds abound

Collections of these dome-like hills are common in landscapes throughout the United States. Depending on your region, you might know them as Mima mounds, hogwallow mounds, or even pimple mounds–and their origin isn’t always clear. Theories range from seismic activity to gophers—and even just an accumulation of sediment. The prairie mounds on our homepage today are part of Oregon’s Zumwalt Prairie, a unique landscape in northeast Oregon. Encompassing some 330,000 acres, It’s of one of the largest remaining intact tracts of bunchgrass prairie in North America. Once part of an extensive grassland in the region, this portion has remained preserved due to its high elevation, which made farming difficult.

2018年曼哈顿悬日期间的克莱斯勒大厦与42号街，纽约市 42nd Street with the Chrysler Building during Manhattanhenge in 2018, New York City (© Dennis Fischer Photography/Getty Images)

A day to celebrate the sun

A few times each year, the rising and setting suns align with the east-west streets of Manhattan--commonly referred to as 'Manhattanhenge.' While the exact timing varies slightly from one year to the next, it usually occurs a few weeks before and after the summer and winter solstices. Tonight's sunset will find the full sun's golden rays streaming directly through Manhattan's major cross streets.

The name Manhattanhenge was created and popularized by NYC native and astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson as an homage to Stonehenge. But Manhattan isn't the only place you can experience a 'henge' day--cities like Chicago and Toronto are also drawing crowds trying to capture a moment where the cosmos perfectly aligns with the modern.

松木国家森林，佛罗里达州 Pine Log State Forest, Florida (© plainpicture/Cavan Images)

In praise of bogs, swamps, and marshes

Swamps and bogs probably aren’t the first that comes to mind when it comes to America’s celebrated landscapes. That’s a shame, since wetlands like these play a crucial role in the health of our ecosystems. In addition to providing unique habitat to the many species that call wetlands home, they filter water, provide a natural buffer from storms, absorb flood waters, and capture carbon from the atmosphere—helping to protect our planet from climate change.

Each year in the month of May, environmental groups and partners celebrate the humble bog as part of American Wetlands Month. You can find some of the country’s healthiest examples of wetlands in Florida, home to swamps, which are dominated by forests, and marshes, which are home to grasses, rushes, and weeds. Today’s homepage comes from Pine Log State Forest, located near the town of Ebro in the Florida Panhandle. Established in 1936, it’s Florida’s oldest state forest, and a fine place to explore.

Steamtown National Historic Site in Scranton, Pennsylvania © Walter Bibikow/Danita Delimont

Looking back on 150 years of rail travel

In 1986, work began to convert an old railyard in Scranton, Pennsylvania from a relic to a heritage preservation site now known as Steamtown. A donated collection of train engines, some dating back to the 1800s, gave Steamtown some exhibits to show off, while the fully functional railyard provides a live demonstration of how trains work—and how rail transit greatly changed the United States.

On this day 150 years ago, in 1869, the Golden Spike was hammered into the First Transcontinental Railroad. It created the first rail line to link the established railways of the eastern United States with the rapidly expanding railroads of the West, making transcontinental travel via train a reality. Need some context? The alternative at the time would be to traverse the nearly 2,000 mile stretch between Omaha, Nebraska and San Francisco by horse, wagon, or your own two feet. With rail travel now an option, America’s Westward Expansion was suddenly in high gear.

冰川国家公园里的圣玛丽瀑布，蒙大拿 St. Mary Falls in Glacier National Park, Montana (© Pung/Shutterstock)