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A tribute to heroes

W ork began this past weekend on one of America's newest national parks. The families of the people aboard Flight 93, which went down in Somerset, Pa., in the Sept. 11 attacks, will gather at the crash site today for the ceremonial groundbreaking.

America's national parks preserve our most sacred natural spaces, such as Yosemite and the Grand Canyon, as well as important pieces of our national history such as the battlefields at Gettysburg. Construction of the first phase of the Pennsylvania memorial is scheduled to be completed in time for a dedication ceremony on the 10th anniversary of the 2001 attacks.

The Flight 93 memorial will be the only Sept. 11 site designated as a national park, which means that every citizen will be a part owner and steward of this monument. Since Sept. 11, tremendous work has been done to create this 2,220-acre park. While the memorial is surely important to those who lost loved ones that day, its meaning for the rest of us cannot be understated.

Miami's smart new hotels

So what'll it be? The place with the six infinity-edge swimming pools or the one with the bathroom chandelier that doubles as a shower head? The resort where beach butlers roam the premises with champagne carts or the hotel where no guest even on the most scorching of days is far from a chilled facial towel?

You've gotta hand it to Miami. What other city would double down on conspicuous consumption in these perilous times?

To be fair, Miami's glittering new (and newly renovated) properties have been in the works for some time; all were planned long before the economic crunch. But even as the city's hotels deal with unprecedented low occupancy, all hail to the newcomers: either anachronistic monuments to excess or perversely reassuring, depending on your point of view.

Postcard from Illinois

Run your fingers over a relief map of the United States, and southeastern Illinois will feel nearly as flat and smooth as Florida. But here at the edge of the Ohio River Valley lies a pocket of sandstone bluffs and canyons: The Garden of the Gods, once layers of sediment under inland seas, today part of the Shawnee National Forest.

It was a warm Sunday in the fall when I followed a short trail to a slot in the rock. I climbed through and a dramatic panorama of rock towers opened before me. The scene was a more modest version of the stark canyons and mountains of the Southwest -- the colors were not as brilliant, the formations not as large or as jagged, the foliage more lush -- but it was surely not a sight I expected in the Midwest.

I followed the trail -- I would be exaggerating if I said ''hiked'' -- for its quarter-mile length, sometimes stepping out on the wide, flat tops of the rock towers to admire the view.

Riding the rails makes getting there the fun part

It's that rare vacation moment when everyone is happy at the same time. And all it took was an old-fashioned train in a remote Arizona town and a singing cowboy leading the kids in a spirited rendition of Old MacDonald had a Farm .

''Our kids have never been on a train before,'' said Mary Macho, visiting from Eden Prairie, Minn., with her husband, 10-year-old twins and 8-year-old. ``This is a new adventure for all of us.''

''And this is a lot better than me having to drive!'' adds her husband Dennis.

Ariz. governor opposes halt on new mining claims

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer objects to a ban on filing new mining claims on nearly 1 million acres of federal land in northern Arizona for two years while a permanent prohibition is under study.

Most of the Bureau of Land Management and National Forest land covered by a July order is in the Arizona Strip located north of Grand Canyon National Park. The rest is located south of the canyon.

There's been a flurry of new mining claims, including for uranium.