It felt like paddling through soggy cereal. My wife and I were deep within Everglades National Park, struggling to kayak past dense mats of periphyton, a mass of algae, fungi and other organisms. Making matters worse, numerous water trail markers were missing, seemingly swept away by recent hurricanes. After several confusing detours, the sun was getting low, and we were getting worried.
We carried a map, compass and headlamps, but we had no desire to navigate through this enigmatic landscape after dark. Fortunately, the periphyton let up, and the markers returned. The final mile of our six-mile jaunt took us through intriguing mangrove tunnels and channels of dark water. Approaching the boat landing, we enjoyed a beautiful sunset from the water.
We’d come to South Florida to investigate several mysteries related to the Everglades’ tortured past. Seminole refugees once hid from the U.S. Army in these wetlands. Rum runners moved their contraband through here during Prohibition. In the late 1800s, plumage poachers hunted subtropical birds to near-extinction before being stopped. Bodies regularly turned up, typically swept here by floods but sometimes dumped by criminals. There’s even a Cold War missile site, if you know where to look.
During the early 20th century, most residents surrounding the Everglades considered it a worthless swamp that should be drained and developed. Then, conservationist Marjory Stoneman Douglas changed public perceptions with three little words, and the “River of Grass” was recognized for being a dynamic ecosystem worth protecting as a national park beginning in 1947.
Yet old legends linger, and people still talk about a lost city of the Everglades, where gangster Al Capone may have had an outpost. Is it just a rumor, or could there be some truth behind the tale? In this case, Capone’s Outfit left no records to help us. But keep your eyes peeled around the ghost town of Pinecrest, on the Loop Road in the adjoining Big Cypress National Preserve, and you might spot the ruins that locals believe were owned by the infamous mobster.
As we drove away, I considered how many fascinating mysteries I had come across while exploring National Park Service sites over the years. Some stories happened inside famous national parks, like that of the 1920s couple, Glen and Bessie Hyde, who vanished while rafting the wild Colorado River through Grand Canyon National Park. Other tales came from little-known units like Dinosaur National Monument on the Colorado-Utah state line, which was home to legendary frontierswoman Josie Bassett, who was accused of being a bootlegger and tried and acquitted for cattle rustling.
To unravel these stories, I hit the ground to follow the clues through our national parks, researching what became my new book, Mysteries of the National Parks: 35 Stories of Baffling Disappearances, Unexplained Phenomena and More.In this book, I present infamous crimes, buried treasures and hidden histories from across the entire National Park System, currently 433 units and counting amounting to 133,000 total square miles of land and water. That adds up to a lot of wild, undeveloped and historic territory where many unexpected things have happened. Along the way, I share travel tips for visiting these parks and bringing the puzzles to life.
Beyond the Everglades, here are six more enigmatic questions you can ponder in our national parks.
What happened to the Lost Colony of Roanoke?
Several years ago, my wife and I were road-tripping through the Outer Banks of North Carolina when we stopped at Fort Raleigh National Historic Site. This smaller and lesser-known National Park Service unit preserves the site of a better-known story that helped inspire my new book.
The Lost Colony was the first English settlement in North America—until it mysteriously vanished from Roanoke Island sometime after its establishment in 1587. In 1590, a long-delayed relief party arrived to find the townsite abandoned. They saw no signs of violence, and two carvings on trees suggested the colonists had relocated south to live with the Croatoan tribe. That night, the relief party’s ship was blown to sea, ending their search.
All subsequent efforts to locate the colonists failed for various reasons, and rumors of their fate ranged widely. Some said they lived peacefully among local tribes for decades. Others told tales of an English-style village hidden in the pine forests of the mainland. Some stories spoke of a massacre. Yet for years to come, visitors to the area would report encounters with local tribespeople, and tales of their ancestors, who had European features.
Today, it’s an excellent park with indoor and outdoor exhibits, including a nature trail winding through the original site and a reconstructed earthen fortification. An outdoor theater shows the long-running symphonic drama The Lost Colony. Nearby, the Freedom Trail leads to the site of the Freedmen’s Colony, home to formerly enslaved African Americans after the Civil War.
Did a private pilot spot the first flying saucer above Mount Rainier?
Today, you can visit the scene of the first modern UFO sighting at Mount Rainier National Park, 60 miles south of Seattle, Washington.
On a sunny afternoon in June 1947, a private pilot named Kenneth Arnold was flying his small plane through the skies above Mount Rainier National Park. Peering down at the dormant volcano, he searched the icy slopes for wreckage from a recent military crash.
Suddenly, a blinding flash illuminated the cabin. A stunned Arnold reportedly watched as a chain of nine bright objects flew toward the mountain at incredible speeds. He said they were shaped like crescent moons and moved erratically, like saucers skipping across water. After Arnold landed in Yakima, his story spread quickly across a war-weary nation, with one newspaper coining the infamous term “flying saucer.”
The resulting mix of mystery and mass panic would spawn a worldwide craze, leading to countless UFO reports, hoaxes and sci-fi depictions. A controversial military investigation was followed by conspiracy theories that introduced the concept of so-called men in black. Meanwhile, the infamous Roswell incident in New Mexico happened exactly two weeks after Arnold’s sighting. Ultimately, most incidents could be easily explained, but not all.
Today, you can visit the scene of the first modern UFO sighting at Mount Rainier National Park, 60 miles south of Seattle. Head to the popular southern side of the park, around the Henry M. Jackson Memorial Visitor Center, where scenic drives and hiking trails offer stunning views of the mountain. To further bring this mystery to life, consider hiking or biking the old Westside Road, a partially paved abandoned highway project. After four miles (one way), you’ll reach the Marine Memorial, which offers views of the Tahoma Glacier. Still entombed in the ice is the wreckage of the military plane—along with the bodies of 32 servicemen—that Arnold was searching for in 1947.
How could a sand dune swallow a boy?
It was a hot summer day in 2013 at Indiana Dunes National Park, when a pair of dads led their sons in a footrace up the slopes of Mount Baldy. About midway, a young boy named Nathan Woessner diverted to examine a small hole in the sand. Suddenly, he plummeted feet first into the void and was gone. When the dads tried to claw away the sand, the hole collapsed. This set off a frantic dig involving bystanders and authorities—a race to save Nathan before it was too late.
For thousands of years, the southern shore of Lake Michigan has been lined by massive sand dunes. Over time, most of these dunes were naturally stabilized by grass and trees. Yet Mount Baldy remained an outlier, a giant pile of bare sand. From offshore winds, it gradually migrated inland, covering structures and trees in its path. Though no one realized it, for years, strange holes had been appearing on Mount Baldy, only to quickly collapse and vanish.
Nathan had fallen 11 feet deep into one such void, created by a tree trunk that had decomposed inside the dune. Fortunately, this left an air pocket, and the boy was rescued alive. Some observers later pointed out that this hazard of the natural world had long been known about colloquially as a “devil’s stovepipe.” However, the general public remained unaware. Even modern scientists had yet to recognize the features, with subsequent academic research in 2015 terming them dune decomposition chimneys.
Today, the park service monitors for these dangerous voids in the sand, restricting visitor access on Mount Baldy to ranger-led hikes that are typically held during the summer season. The rest of the park trails and beaches are unrestricted, offering a chance to explore this dynamic landscape next to the Great Lakes.
