Yellowstone National Park was the first of its kind in the world. Since then, the idea of declaring and protecting a place of nature as a national park has traveled the world.

Yellowstone National Park is the original of a project that has decisively shaped our understanding of nature worth protecting, of prioritizing national interests over local, often indigenous relationships to places, and of nature tourism. This is why we conducted participant observation as tourists in this national park.

Social anthropologists often adopt the perspective of “unfamiliarizing the familiar” as a key research strategy.

When we studied tourism in Yellowstone National Park, we used this perspective to explore the specifics of nature tourism in this place.

We paid attention to very experience as a tourist to the national park: We noticed what tourists do, what park rangers tell, what exhibitions show, and how our experience is shaped by the tourist infrastructure. And we also focused on what remains untold.

We walk along footpaths to the main iconic attractions. This is the lasting memory for most tourists. The vast majority of tourists never looks for the hidden gems off the beaten paths.

Posing for photographs in front of iconic attractions has become an integral part of the travel experience.

Taking pictures structures the tourist experience. The captured moments serve as memory aids that allow tourists to preserve, relive, and share their experiences beyond the actual journey.

Popular sites attract crowds of nature lovers, and tourists rarely have these places to themselves.

Ample toilets are available for nature lovers.

Native peoples' ties to the area were rarely mentioned to visitors of the park. Only recently has the Yellowstone Tribal Heritage Center been established. There, we learned about several actions that reclaim Indigenous presence in the national park. For example, descendants of Native peoples who frequented the area prior to their removal in the 1800s have raised tipi lodges.