A married couple packed up everything from their home in Chicago and bought an RV to travel the country full-time, with one goal: to visit as many national parks as possible along the way. With each stop in each park, Brad and Matt Kirouac immerse themselves and the listeners – and the Kirouac’s dog Finn! – in these beautiful, larger-than-life places and share our discoveries about what makes them truly special, from the intimidating wildlife of the Everglades to the cinematic lore of Redwood, all with a dash of what it’s really like to live in an RV full time.

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In our inaugural episode of Parklandia, hosts Matt and Brad bring friends along for a murder mystery train ride and explore the true comeback story of Cuyahoga Valley National Park, which went from notoriously polluted to winning the Oscars of rivers.

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If we were to hop into a time machine and travel back to the year 220 million BC, let’s just say things wouldn’t go well for us. This was a time when the food chain was dominated by crocodiles the size of our RV, and when modern day Arizona was a veritable Jurassic Park of dinosaurs and jungles as beautiful as they were dangerous. Imagine us visiting Isla Nublar, but instead of Jeff Goldblum’s pithy comic relief, it’s pure terror and there is no Dr. Grant to save you. 

Fortunately, this era has been fossilized and preserved for a far safer experience in the year 2019, and in this episode of Parklandia, we recount our visit to Petrified Forest National Park and the crystalline beauty of its namesake attraction.

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In the late 1100’s, the cliff faces of Mesa Verde were veritable cities filled with homes, towers, and central plazas. Then, the ancestral Puebloan people completely deserted their homes and communities, effectively disappearing... except for their spirits which still live in these mesas. This episode we recount our visit to those cliff homes and beyond.

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If Batman were to live in a national park, he would definitely live at Carlsbad Caverns. The Dark Knight would surely feel right at home in the enormous, pitch black chambers, just him and a couple hundred thousand roommates who fly out to eat bugs each night. This episode, Matt and Brad explore the caves, take in the wildlife, and work up an appetite at Carlsbad.

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Guadalupe Mountains National Park in West Texas is a paradise for hikers and rock-lovers, with the tallest peaks in the state, gypsum sand dunes, tons of human history, and the largest Permian fossil reef in the world. And apart from the whole Matt almost dying thing, it made for a wonderful visit! This episode, Matt and Brad battle Mother Nature and enjoy a lot of tuna salad.

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Most people equate flooding with disaster, but it can do just the opposite sometimes—like at Congaree National Park in South Carolina, where flooding represents the circle of life. Matt and Brad go kayaking and make some new friends, and even answer some listener mail.

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Fair warning, listeners: anytime we reminisce about Badlands National Park we tend to get super emotional. Matt first traveled to this South Dakota wonder in 2016 and the Badlands brought on a sweeping sense of awe and admiration. In this episode, we recount our trip here together to this landscape that is part Grand Canyon, part Mars.

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