What on earth???

While I was busy hiking and celebrating the 100th anniversary of the National Park Service, I was obviously not paying attention to what Congress was doing, or not doing.

I just read that there may be yet another government shut-down. Without a spending bill, our national parks may be shuttered again.

Remember October 2013? There was a lot of outrage when it happened, though if we were paying attention, we knew way ahead of time.

Now, you may say that in an election year, there will be some compromise on September 30 at 11:59. Even so, a lot of the damage is already done. Parks, especially large multi-entrance parks like Great Smoky Mountains National Park, have to have a plan in place in case of a shut-down.

What a waste of park staff’s time to have to work on what they would do in case of a shut-down.

Since the beginning of October is on a weekend, some articles even suggest that no one would notice – except those of us trying to visit a national park. Well, that’s us and we vote.

We can alert our Congressional representative and Senators that we’re paying attention. And see you on the trail in October!