Happy New Year! Just like this gorgeous sunrise at Canyonlands National
Park in Utah, we hope your new year is filled with beauty and adventure.
Photo by Greg Sager (http://ift.tt/18oFfjl).

americasgreatoutdoors:

Mother Nature shows her power with this dramatic lightning storm over the Needles District at Canyonlands National Park in Utah. Photo from last summer courtesy of Claudia Castillo. ⚡

Ending the year with our most popular post on Tumblr in 2016: This dramatic shot of a lightning storm over Canyonlands National Park in Utah.

From all of us at the Interior Department, have a safe and happy new year. And here’s to amazing adventures and exploring America’s great outdoors in 2017!

You see some amazing things on America’s public lands, like this cute little bobcat hanging out within the snow-covered trees in eastern Oregon. Can you spot it? While common, bobcats are rarely seen. Sometimes called wildcats, bobcats are roughly twice as big as the average house cat. They have long legs, large paws, and tufted ears, and gets its name for its tail, which appears to be cut or “bobbed.” Photo by Kevin Eldredge, @mypubliclands.

Badlands National Park in South Dakota can seem like a formidable and forbidding landscape, but with proper planning and a sense of adventure, the park is a nature lover’s paradise year round. The spires, pinnacles and ravines, which frustrated earlier travelers, provide a visual “gateway to forever” with views that can stretch over 50 miles. Winter scenes, like this, are particularly impressive. Photo by Mike Pflaum, National Park Service.