America's national parks have never been more popular, and that popularity is quietly becoming their biggest problem. Understaffed, underfunded, and packed well past capacity, some of the country's most beautiful trails have turned into some of its most dangerous. In this episode, we break down the budget crunch and the crowd crisis behind the postcard views, and pick up five C2 expressions that will serve you well far beyond the trailhead.
⚡ 5 Key Expressions
Expression 01
Resort to
To turn to a particular action, usually one you would rather avoid, because better options have run out. The phrase carries a quiet note of reluctance or desperation. Some understaffed parks resorted to QR codes and an honor system for entrance fees last summer, since there weren't enough rangers left to collect them in person. Whatever follows "resort to" is rarely anyone's first choice.
- "When negotiations stalled, the company resorted to arbitration."
- "I couldn't find my keys, so I resorted to climbing through the window."
Expression 02
Abide by
To formally comply with a rule, decision, or agreement, even when no one is enforcing it. The word shares a root with "abide," meaning to tolerate, but this phrasal use is distinct and considerably more formal, showing up constantly in legal, contractual, and policy language. Understaffed parks are increasingly asking visitors to abide by an honor system rather than a staffed checkpoint, which only works if people actually do.
- "All contractors must abide by the safety regulations outlined in section four."
- "I don't love the new roommate schedule, but I'll abide by it for now."
Expression 03
Deferred maintenance
Repair work that should already have happened but keeps getting postponed, usually for lack of budget, letting the true cost quietly accumulate in the background. "Defer" means to push something back, and this compound has become a fixed term in infrastructure, property, and business contexts. The National Park Service reported roughly twenty-three billion dollars in deferred maintenance projects at the end of 2024, from crumbling restrooms to unrepaired trails.
- "Years of deferred maintenance on the bridge finally led to its closure."
- "Honestly, this argument is just deferred maintenance on our friendship, we should have had it months ago."
Expression 04
Treacherous
Dangerous in a way that looks manageable on the surface but hides real risk underneath, so the danger tends to catch people off guard. It applies just as naturally to terrain and situations as it does to people. At Utah's Angel's Landing, cables help hikers cross the trail's most treacherous section, and at least seventeen people have died there from falls when crowding made those cables harder to hold safely.
- "The negotiations entered a treacherous phase once both sides stopped compromising."
- "That icy parking lot is treacherous, I nearly went down twice."
Expression 05
A/The best-kept secret
Something excellent that most people don't know about, precisely because so few people have discovered it yet. There's a built-in irony to the phrase: the moment it becomes widely known, it stops qualifying as one. While places like Yosemite buckle under record crowds, quieter parks like Michigan's Isle Royale, reachable only by boat or seaplane, remain a genuine best-kept secret for travelers who actually want solitude.
- "The startup was long considered the industry's best-kept secret before the acquisition made headlines."
- "This little noodle place around the corner is my best-kept secret, please don't tell everyone."
🎭 The Dialogue: Second Thoughts
Maya has been planning a big national park trip, and Alex is about to complicate things. They're chatting over coffee at a shared office desk, late afternoon.
📍 Office desk, late afternoon. Maya has three browser tabs open comparing trail maps. Alex leans over with his coffee.
Maya: I finally booked our Yosemite trip. Though I just read that last summer the park had to resort to QR codes because they didn't have enough staff to collect entrance fees.
Alex: Yeah, the whole system basically runs on visitors agreeing to abide by the honor system, which feels like a gamble given how packed these places get.
Maya: It really is. There's twenty-three billion dollars in deferred maintenance sitting on the books nationwide, and meanwhile Half Dome's cable route gets busier every single weekend.
Alex: Busier is putting it kindly. I read that the crowding on some of these treacherous cliffside trails has actually turned fatal.
Maya: Okay, now I'm having serious second thoughts about Yosemite.
Alex: Honestly, if you want the views without the gamble, look into Isle Royale. It's Michigan's best-kept secret, boat access only, practically empty all summer.
Maya: I've genuinely never heard of it.
Alex: That's kind of the point.
🧠 Episode Quiz
Can you answer this?
Which of these actually became the very first national park in the United States?
✅ Answer: B — Yellowstone, established in 1872, is officially the first national park in the United States, and the first in the world. The 1864 Yosemite Grant did protect that land eight years earlier, but it handed the area to the state of California rather than the federal government, so it doesn't count as a national park in the technical sense. Yosemite itself didn't become a national park until 1890.
📚 Bonus Vocabulary
On the books (phrase) — officially recorded, usually in a financial or accounting sense. Maya uses it to describe the billions in unresolved repair costs sitting in the National Park Service's ledger. "The company still has two unresolved lawsuits on the books from last year."
Putting it kindly (phrase) — a dry, understated way of signaling that the real situation is actually worse than what was just described. Alex uses it right before revealing that the crowding has turned fatal. "The reviews were mixed, putting it kindly, most of them were brutal."
Catch off guard (phrase) — to surprise someone at a moment when they weren't prepared or alert. It captures exactly why "treacherous" danger is so dangerous, it's the kind you don't see coming. "The sudden change in leadership caught the whole department off guard."
